


let me light your fire, let me turn you on

by grosskopf



Series: elemenverse: empyrosis [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Angst, Arranged Marriage, Blood and Injury, Dark Fantasy, Elemental Magic, F/F, Fantasy, Girl Penis, Medical Inaccuracies, Mild Sexual Content, Military Inaccuracies, Non-Traditional Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, POV Alternating, POV Third Person Limited, Past Abuse, Present Tense, Prostitution, Smut, Whump
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2021-01-29
Packaged: 2021-03-03 22:48:48
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 8
Words: 22,684
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24703324
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/grosskopf/pseuds/grosskopf
Summary: Dominick Thur is an alpha only a few months from marrying an omega, not for love, but an arranged marriage that none of them is interested. She's a fire-elemental captain who follows all the rules, so she does her best to ignore her attraction towards Marion, one of the sex workers of her quadrant. While Natallia, her omega bride, doesn't even try.[title from Devil's Choir by Digital Daggers]
Relationships: Original Female Character/Original Female Character
Series: elemenverse: empyrosis [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1850011
Comments: 23
Kudos: 71





	1. I

It’s a debate, Dominick knows, if those like her are or aren’t humans. She doesn’t think it’s human to be someone who can produce and control fire. She does like the term _elemental_ (so it’s the term it’ll be used here) _._ She looks at her hand, tiny flames licking her skin and feels like the gentle touch she had longed for since she can remember being alive. Even if she can say she does have some friends, there’s no… _comfortable intimacy._ (She knows that the closest to _comfortable intimacy_ she’d get is _maybe_ with her future wife, it's more hope than certainty).

She pushes her hand into the water, now warm due to the constant heat coming from her. Dominick submerges her head too, it drowns the voices coming from outside (that aren’t even that loud, she knows it’s a privilege to have her own bathtub) and calms down her racing thoughts. She doesn't really like to think about her future, about what she needs to do, the fate to fulfill as the Alpha she is.

She’s on night shift for the next few months, during the whole winter, to her mother’s despair. Not that the older woman really cares about Dominick in general (what seems to make sense for her and not for any other person she mentioned, maybe just a difference between humans and elementals, part of her doesn't care anymore. Most of her doesn't care anymore). Dominick is quite sure that she would have been thrown to the wolves if she was born an Omega, fully useless to marry who she’s supposed to marry. She knows her mother thinks she’ll run away with a prostitute during one of those shifts, since the quadrant she’s designated is an area full of late night workers. Dominick thinks it’s a stupid fear. (Even if she thinks it'd be almost _funny_ if she runs away with a street sex worker.)

Dominick may hate it, but she knows she’s supposed to follow three golden rules:

1) Don’t have sex with humans. It’s easy to follow, most humans aren’t interested in having sex with Alphas and ones with elemental powers. She fits both, she has always been told she could break and set someone on fire without even trying, just loosing a bit of control (and she almost lost control during an orgasm a couple of times before).

2) Don’t have sex with street workers. Also easy, most of them avoid soldiers. And avoid high-rank soldiers like Dominick. Reputation was there, she gave up on couting how many times she heard of soldiers like her leaving pregnant women behind and pretty much destroying their lives, she's sure that she'd avoid soldiers if she worked in the strrets.

3) Stay away from possible attractions and feelings. Easy, but the one she hates. Her mother likes to remind her _every day_ that her fate is already decided. The marriage was decided before Dominick was born.

Or not so easy. In her night shifts, there’s one woman that just… makes her feel something. Not romantic, she’s not sure if it's an attraction. Yes, during the hot summer nights of her last late shift string made her feel some lust. The woman is always wearing revealing clothes, not a surprise, but when it’s not cold? Skirt so short that any light breeze revealed a hint of white lacy panties underneath. Black crop top showing the flat stomach and tight enough that Dominick wondered how her boobs didn’t escape. High heels that made her ass caught everyone's attention.

Dominick follows rules, but her body didn’t. A boner for a prostitute made those shifts complicated. Only in her last week Dominick noticed that a couple of jerking off sessions helped.

She doesn’t even know if the woman will be there, but she decided to be safe. She moves up, just enough to let her nose above water. She did it twice already, one once she got up and another only a few hours later. Dominick hates how she’s getting hard only thinking a little bit about the unnamed prostitute. It's stupid, almost like a virgin teenager who never had sex before.

It’s not like she never have sex. Despite the arrangement, she’s someone with natural needs (and she’s quite sure her mother knows, but pretends Dominick is a virgin waiting for her Omega). She does have less sex than her peers, not everyone is really up to have sex with Alphas, and Omegas - not that she's really into them - still a rare occurance in the military (she’s not sure why, if it’s the system or how many of them are born in rich and traditional families. She knows that her family’s - or her mother - power almost stopped her from enlisting). It's a bit frustrating how there's only _one_ person around who she was safe to have sex with. The one Omega/human hyrbrid, or Sigma, that she feels safe with to not have weird mostly clothed sex.

She wraps her fingers around her half-hard dick, like she did countless times before. She presses around the base, the thicker skin that is a remind of why Alphas like her ain’t supposed to have sex with humans (they do, but still… dangerous, her powers could kill and her knot could hurt badly, even if it's quite rare for her to use her powers when not in full control and knotting? She doesn't remember the last time it happened). She closes her eyes and starts to move her hand. It’s a weird feeling to touch herself underwater, even if she does it more often than she admits. Soon enough, she’s bucking her hips, fucking into her hand with the kind of strength she’d never use in someone. Thinking too much about that prostitute, some guilt burns (but she knows she’d feel worse thinking about her bride). The water muffles her moans, not that they’re loud.

 _Shit,_ she groans, soapy water covering her tongue, and cums. Milky cum mixing with the hot water, she doesn't know if this is hot or disgusting. She lifts her body and spits the water, cursing herself mentally due to the taste. She moves her hand side to side, watching her seed disappear. She stays for a few moments, relax just a little bit more. Then she gets up, water dripping for a moment before it starts to evaporate when she warms herself on purpose. A quite useful skill, if you ask her, she thinks it’s a lot more practical to get dry in a moment with her warmth than needing to use a towel.

Dominick steps out, making sure she’s not getting the floor wet. She sees her reflection, she isn’t sure why there’s a full-body mirror behind the bathroom door. Dominick isn’t sure about many things, as you probably already noticed. Every hint of tan she managed to get during summer is long gone, what is annoying when she had to spend _hours_ laying under the hot summer sun to have any tan. But there's nothing she can do about it.

Tall (everyone in her unit is over 6ft, so she doesn’t get much attention), muscles that barely need to be maintained. Scars, she lost count of how many times she got hurt during training. Military training and her mother’s training. She traces a faded scar around her forearm, a time she blew up part of the shed they were using and a chain made of ice was around her arm before she could apologize. (It happened way too many times, getting punished before she could apologize.)

She knows she looks like any other standard Alpha, including the little friend between her legs. The little friend that was showing signs of life after her _third_ jerking off session.

“Why you-” she pokes her half-hard dick. “Fucking…” it only makes it get harder and points up like an eager little bitch. “The fuck are you doing?”

Someone knocks her door: “Dominick! Your shift starts in fifteen minutes, why are you still there?” She recognizes one of the soldiers that have shifts with her.

“I’m almost ready,” no, she’s not. “Just a minute.”

“Ok, right, just finish whatever you’re doing.”

She’s pretty sure the soldier knows she’s having some… me time. She looks down, she knows she can’t leave with a boner, even with the undershorts that almost managed to hide the existence of a penis (and _should_ help avoid erections). So she decided to have the quickest orgasm of her life. Moving her hand fast enough to make her arms’ muscles ache, but there's no better option when she has only a few minutes. Cleans everything up and puts the uniform, feeling a bit sensitive, but sure she won't have an erection if she sees the woman tonight.

“Here you are, fucking finally,” the soldier offers a light punch on her arm. “Why took you so long?”

“I like baths,” she punches him back. “So, we’re in the same shift again? Are you following me or what?”

“I’m following the schedule.”

“I know, kiddo.”

“I’m not _that_ younger than you,” he crosses his arms like an adorable child, she smiles a bit, he's one of the closest to a friend that she has.

“Sure,” she smiles at his reaction.

* * *

Dominick isn’t admitting anytime soon that women in general can be distracting. She doesn’t like it, it’s way too annoying, it always makes her feel like a stupid teenager even if she's an _adult_ who's _not_ controlled by her sexual urges. She can focus on her job, walking around and looking out for trouble-makers. It’s hard to not notice that some of those street workers are… not happy with soldiers around. Something she could understand, soldiers in general aren’t very… gentle. (She had sex with some, she knows how they tend to be rough, even if she thinks it's more about their hybrid status than their soldier status. She still can't really deal with how _hard_ one can ride her, how it didn't... _tear_ them?)

She thinks it’s almost funny how more male workers seem to be interested in soldiers than females. She doesn’t know if they’re more reckless or just want more adventure. There were a few times she almost gave in, pulled one of them into one of those guard booths that were escapade spots and not actual guard booths. But Dominick knows better than being controlled by those urges and offering a chance for them to get hurt.

She got really close to doing it the time a guy, she noticed that he usually had male clients, only got closer, hooking his fingers on her belt loops, when she warned him about the fact that she’s an Alpha. The boy only seemed more interested, moved a hand a bit more south. But Dominick prefers to follow rules. Even if his sad face when she pushed him, not even hiding the fact that he could see the bulge, almost made her pull him to the closest booth and have a quickie. _He's human, you're gonna hurt him_ , stopped her and was enough to calm down her little hard problem.

Dominick shakes her head, thinking too much about the times she almost left her duty wouldn’t help her. She's _adult_ enough to not be distracted by those thoughts.

She makes a turn, following her route and entering in one of the darker alleys. She easily blends with the darkness around her. Her nostrils are attacked by the scents. Alcohol, body fluids and sex. She wouldn’t be surprised if she finds someone on their knees sucking somebody off. It’s easier to breathe when she emerges on the other side, still dark, but every winter night is dark. She likes darkness in general, it's almost too easy to disappear in it, be invisible.

 _Uh, snow,_ she watches the small snowflake fall on her fingertip. There's that part that _hates_ cold, but there's the part that loves how delicate and pretty snowflakes are. The snow distracts her enough to collide with someone, she doesn’t even have time to help. She looks to find a woman on the floor, groaning as someone who had hit a brick wall. Dominick immediately circles the woman, puts her hands under her armpits and lifts her. She doesn't even think about what she's doing, an automatic response to help someone who's on the floor because of her.

“Sorry,” she says, quick and apologetic. “I was distracted,” she lets another snowflake land on her fingertip while the woman turns to her. She blinks, it’s _that_ woman, and she looks as good as always. _Oh..._

“No problem,” the woman steps back quite quickly after eyeing Dominick’s chest, the spot where her rank emblem is embroidered on her uniform. “Oh...” She says so low that Dominick almost can't hear her.

“Are you ok?” Dominick looks up and down, looking for any sign of an injury.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine,” she crosses her arms, it seems to have a shield around her. “Shouldn't you be walking around, soldier?”

“This is part of my route,” she gestures behind herself. “Just… are you sure? It was a quite hard hit.”

“Ye-”

“You barely got off my dick and it’s already after another?” A voice says behind the woman, she turns and Dominick looks above her. A smiling middle-aged man approaches.

“Not your business,” she answers. “Don’t you have a wife waiting for you?”

The man grunt something, probably some bad words, and passes beside them.

“That’s… a rude dude,” Dominick mutters.

“Sure, whatever,” the woman buries her hands on her coat’s pockets. “I’m not offering you my services.”

“I’m on duty.”

“As if it stops soldiers from getting sex.”

“I like to follow rules.”

“Good for you.”

“Hm,” so she’s one of those who don’t like soldiers, Dominick thinks, “good luck on your duty.”

She turns to go back on her track, she’s pretty sure she can feel the woman’s eyes on her back. Part of her already regretted not asking the woman’s name, but she’s almost sure that she wouldn’t get a name.

But, at least, no boner at the moment. She knows it's not good to go out having one for prostitutes, much less one that seemed to not like soldiers. The colision didn't help, Dominick is awared that she's pretty much a stone wall walking around. Probably caused some bruises on the woman, it happened before. She knows that part of what makes her good at her job is exactly being such a solid torch in human form.

Dominick decides to focus on her route, on her job, not in someone that is not interested.

* * *

“Dominick, _Dominick_!” She jumps and almost falls off her bed.

“I’m up, _mother_ ,” she groans, Dominick still doesn’t know why her mother always invades her room. One day the woman will be traumatized by finding her daughter in naughty morning actions. “Privacy, please?”

“We have dinner,” Dominick rolls her eyes, hugging her blanket and happy that she always sleeps with her belly down and could cover herself. “Natallia will be in town for the next few weeks, I want you to spend time with her.”

“You could’ve called, you know that.”

“I wanted to visit my daughter.”

Dominick decides to believe in the lie: “I’m on night duty.”

“I know, but dinner is more important.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Dominick.”

“It’s just dinner, I have work.”

“You’re a captain,” she gestures around the room, only hers and with an included bathroom, one she only has because of her higher rank. “Your superior won’t complain about you having dinner with your _mother_ and your _future wife_.”

“Alright, one dinner. It’s a three months streak, I can’t keep getting breaks for stupid reason.”

“Dinner with family isn’t a stupid reason.”

“Ok. Can you leave now?” She checks the clock in her bedside table. “It’s barely eight in the morning, I want to sleep.”

“It’s late.”

“ _Night duty,_ it’s too early.”

Her mother rolls her eyes, it’s one of those few things they have in common. Dominick isn’t really a big fan of having things in common with her, considering how irritating she could be. The woman turns and leaves. Dominick can feel the room getting warmer as soon as the woman leaves. (She knows her mother does this _get her room colder_ just because Dominick ended up with her Omega mother’s fire powers when everyone expected her to keep the _Alpha with cold powers_ bloodline.)

Dominick groans when she notices that the woman didn’t close the door, so she pretty much crawls towards the door to close it and also to lock it. Maybe she should make sure to always lock it, even if she thinks it wouldn’t change a thing. She falls back in her bed.

Natallia isn’t… the worst. A couple of years older than Dominick (it made her remember that there’s only barely six months to her 21 birthday, _fuck_ ). Taller than expected for an Omega, a thing Dominicks admires. And someone with earth-related powers that makes Dominick to think that maybe it could work better than with someone with ice powers.

She knows she can’t escape it, maybe she should try to make it work.


	2. II

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1) I'm aware that "Dominick" is a male name spelling, I don't care enough to change.  
> 2) I'm updating the tags.  
> 3) I added quick rules of this story on my ABO guide, the link is in the first chapter notes.  
> 4) now this is part of a series, other oneshots will both be with character of this story or be placed in the same universe.

Marion isn’t a fan of fucking in small places. But she has those clients that are sorta regulars that she likes to fuck, so she’ll fuck them _anywhere_.

So here she is, in one of the alleys, a known darker spot that people used constantly to have sex with prostitutes like her. Usually men or Alphas/Betas, which means kneeling prostitutes having their mouth fucked more than any other position. Even not liking elementals that much, she could deal with Omegas, like this one. She’s one of the semi-regulars, always coming after her when she’s in town. Considering how much Marion did like to fuck her, Natallia is really one of her favorite girls to fuck, she knows she’ll sorta miss her. The Omega moaned against her ear, her hands holding onto Marion’s shoulders hard enough to almost bruise, she bends her fingers and probs until she finds what she’s looking for. With confidence, she strokes the woman’s g-spot, again and again, every time she buries her fingers into her.

(Sometimes she thinks about how much fun she’d have working as a male prostitute.)

Her thumb casually flicks her clit every few seconds to pretty much remind her that Marion knows what she’s doing. She’s a _professional,_ she fully knows what she’s doing and loves it. She likes all those sounds. The client’s moans and broken breathing, the wet sounds her pussy are making while Marion slams her hand into her. She’s having fun and is being paid to have that fun.

Life can be good.

The woman holds onto her biceps harder and Marion is sure she will be bruised, but it’s some _good_ bruising so she’s not complaining about it at all. Marion bites her neck, she knows the woman likes to be bitten and marked (and Marion has no idea if it’s an Omega thing or it’s her thing). The bite is enough to push her over the edge. Marion needs some good amount of strength to keep the woman up.

“There you go,” Marion whispers. “My good girl.”

Natallia rests her head on Marion’s shoulder, trying to get her breath back to normal. It’s almost funny how Natallia relaxes against her after an orgasm. She holds the woman’s waist a bit tighter and eases her fingers out of the woman. When Natalia moves back, Marion makes sure that the Omega is looking at her when she sucks her own fingers. Natallia grunts like she wants to be fucked again, but they don’t have time for it.

“You’re getting better at it,” Natallia keeps her hands on Marion’s biceps while the prostitute fixes her pants.

“Practice makes perfect.”

“Yeah, thanks, I gotta go now.”

Natallia throws her arm around Marion’s neck and starts to drag her out of the valley. Marion wonders, for a moment, how it would be to settle down with someone like Natallia. She knows she doesn’t have what an Omega would need during their heats. (And part of her is pretty curious about how it feels to have a dick and fuck someone with it.)

“Oh, shit, fuck, _are you kidding me_?” She says fast enough to sound like one long word while she pushes Marion back into the alley.

“What’s wrong?” Then she hears the known march steps of a soldier. “Fuck.”

She pulls Natallia closer, she knows the woman isn’t supposed to be there and it could be dangerous for _both_ of them. Even if Nathan is around and he can cover for her most of the time (and always when Natallia is around, considering their friendship), Natallia still is an elemental, and elementals aren’t meant to even _interact_ with prostitutes like her.

“Oh, hi,” she hears Nathan, probably talking with the soldier that she heard. “Captain Thur.”

“Officer, this is not your quadrant,” Marion frowns, she’s pretty sure she heard this voice before.

“There was a change of plans.”

“No, there wasn’t.”

“Now you know every soldier’s route?” She’s pretty sure he doesn’t like this soldier.

“I happen to be this quadrant’s captain. You’re not in my list,” _holy shit,_ “also, I can smell Natallia from a block away.” _that’s much worse._

“I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“I won’t tell anyone, just make sure your friend does her naughty stuff in a quadrant where you’re supposed to be.”

“Do-”

“Just because I won’t tell anyone, it doesn’t mean other soldiers won’t either,” there’s a short pause. “And tell her to take a good shower before going back to the mansion, as I said, _I can smell her from a block away_.”

The marching steps fade away in the opposite direction they came from. She notices how Natallia signs beside her, calmer that they didn’t need to talk to the soldier, but still not happy about the encounter. Nathan walks into the alley, he looks nervous and a bit irritated. Definitely not happy about having an encounter with a captain.

“Why the fuck you didn’t tell me that fucking _Dominick_ is the captain of this quadrant?” Natallia pretty much growls on his face.

“Captains don’t do these routes! I mean, they do, but they just spend time fucking. A lot of time fucking, actually!”

“It’s _Dominick,_ what were you expecting? That girl loves to follow all the rules.”

“Sorry, sorry,” he lifts his hands in a calming attempt. “But she said she won’t tell everyone.”

“Does it even matter?”

“Yes!” Marion never saw her this angry. “She shouldn’t know about this!”

“Ok, I got it, I’m sorry.”

Natallia takes a deep breath: “I have to go back to that stupid mansion.”

“Will you come again?” Marion asks, placing her hand on Natallia’s lower back. “And what’s the big deal about this Dominick person?”

“I’ll try to come again in a couple of days,” Marion almost smiles with the fact that Natallia seems a bit more relaxed after being touched. “And Dominick is the Alpha fiancee I told you about.”

“You didn’t mention that you’ll marry a fucking _captain,_ I thought she was a diplomatic-thing person like you.”

“She probably will when her mother steps down.”

“That makes sense,” or not, Marion is more interested in avoiding elementals than trying to understand their politics.

“Is there anywhere to take a shower? she’s kinda right about the scent.”

“I know a place, come on.”

* * *

She found _if you can, meet me during the Winter Festival in two days_ written in Natallia’s note delivered by Nathan. And she has been anxious since that moment, Natalllia is one of her favorite clients and she knows she’ll miss the Omega.

She feels quite nervous about being at the festivals. She doesn’t like to be in places full of people. Full of _soldiers_ and _elementals_ (and hybrids too). But she goes anyway because it’s _probably_ the last time she’ll see a single Natallia. (Maybe the last time she’ll fuck her without enabling cheating.) She chooses her best outfit, that turns out to be all black: leggings, tank top and trench coat, and boots. Not her warmest clothes, but Marion is more than used to be cold. Looking good to attract clients is more important than being warm.

“You came!” Natallia pretty much comes from nowhere barely five minutes after she entered the festival’s main path. (She wonders if it has anything to do with her powers.)

“You invited me.”

“I’m glad you came,” she throws an arm around her neck, Natallia’s coat is a lot warmer than hers. “I’ll introduce you to Dominick, just so she knows with who I am.”

“Oh, ok.”

“Hey, no need to be so nervous.”

“You’ll introduce me to a _captain_ who also is _your fiancee_ and an _Alpha_.”

“Her mother is a lot worse. You’ll be fine.”

She’s not really sure if meeting the fiancee of her favorite semi-regular is a good idea. The fiancee _knows_ Marion was fucking Natallia a few days before. She follows Natallia, not complaining about the warmth coming from her. It takes them a couple of minutes to find the woman.

Marion gulps, she _knew_ she had heard that voice before. The Alpha soldier she collided with a few days ago, she got a nasty bruise out of it. Both because she fell on the stone pathway and because the woman was a walking wall (all soldiers were solid like that, it didn't change the damage). She’s not in her soldier uniform but still looks like someone holding a lot of power despite being in a hoodie and jeans and sporting messy hair. Maybe it’s because she’s an Alpha, maybe it’s her natural posture, Marion isn’t sure. All she knows is that part of her is too nervous about being around someone so much stronger than her.

Natallia holds her closer: “This is Marion, a friend, I’ll go explore around the festival with her.”

“Yeah, sure,” the Alpha nods and it’s obvious that she knows what they will do. “Just make sure you’re not _stinking_ when you come back to the mansion.”

“You better not be stinking either.”

“Do I look like I- _whatever_ ,” she grunts and starts to turn away. “Go ahead, have fun.”

She walks away almost in the same marching way soldiers do in their shifts. _Soldiers are soldiers all the time_. Marion sees her stopping in a stand that was selling cotton candy. Natallia starts to drag her in-between people to her mysterious destination.

“She seems very… dismissive.”

“She wants this marriage as much as I want,” the woman isn’t even subtle about being too close and interested in something more than walking around with her.

“Will you talk a bit more about her now?”

“Nah, it’s not important,” she almost purrs on Marion’s ear. “Your fingers inside me are a lot more important.”

“I agree, do you know a place?”

“Yeah, I have a spot.”

“Great.”

Natallia really isn’t the most subtle and was a bit funny. And also always makes things a lot more interesting. There’s something _too_ exciting about fucking her now. More people, more soldiers that could catch them. She doesn’t doubt that the Alpha soldier knows what Natallia will do and if she doesn’t want this marriage, makes sense that she gives zero fucks about Natallia’s sex life. Marion is sure Natallia also gives zero fucks about the captain’s sex life.

“Soldiers call these _guard but not guard booths_ ,” Natallia says, pushing the guard booth door. “You know, young soldiers can be _too_ horny.”

“As if _you_ aren’t horny.”

“Can you blame me?”

“No.”

Natallia locks the door before pulling Marion closer. She is warmer than most people, despite not having fire powers. It’s a pleasant detail during a cold day like this one. The booth had a desk, a clearly uncomfortable chair, and a couch with suspicious stains. The couch where Natallia pushed her onto, she takes off her heavy coat and then climbs on her lap. Marion could say she definitely likes when clients like Natallia climb her lap and sound so turned on without Marion needing to do anything.

Marion pulls her closer before kissing her. She knows kissing could be too personal for other workers, she doesn’t care enough. Part of her wants to have fun. And a woman moaning on her mouth is quite fun. Marion moves her hands down, grabbing handfulls of Natallia’s juicy ass. _It’s not fair how Omegas have such delicious ass_ , she thinks. Natallia grinds against her, she digs nails into Marion’s coat.

“Take it off,” she grunts, no grace while grabbing Marion’s collar.

“It’s cold.”

“You’ll be warm real quick.”

Natallia isn’t wrong: “So get off me for a moment,” Natallia is visibly not amused by it. “Your idea.”

She groans, but leaves Marion’s lap. And helps her to get rid of her coat. Natallia doesn’t hesitate to hold her arms. Marion may not be the buffest woman out there, but she has some definition. (It’s really useful to when she has stand-up sex and has to hold a lady up). Natallia moves her hands up and down Marion’s arms a couple of times before pushing her on the coach and climbing her lap again. She let’s Marion take off her shirt and Marion proceeds to leave bite marks all over Natallia’s chest. She let a hand placed firmly on the back of Natallia’s back and moves her other hand under her pants. She almost moans when her fingertips touched Natallia’s pussy.

“Already so wet,” Marion whispers against her ear. “I barely touched you.”

“You’re just _so fucking hot_.”

“I’m flattered,” she bites the Omega’s shoulder, making her moan. “Happy to make you this wet without even trying.”

Marion pushes her finger slightly against her entrance, just enough to tease the woman and not give her any. Natallia moves her hips down, trying to get more contact. Marion giggles and holds her tighter, short nails digging into her skin, she knows that the Omega is more than strong enough to fuck herself on Marion’s fingers if she wants to.

This feeling of _control_ over someone powerful like an elemental. It’s _addicting._ It feels so good to know that this woman melts under her fingertips. She would love to do this in a regular basis.

“Would it be too bold of me to assume you’ve been thinking about this all morning?” Marion pushes the tip of her finger into the woman.

“Maybe, I just really need you to fuck me.”

“Don’t ya _always_ need me to fuck you?”

“You’re so fucking lucky that I’m not around during my heats.”

“I’m actually curious about your heat.”

“Even if you can’t really help me during those?”

“I’m just curious.”

“Yeah, alright. Just fuck me already, will you, please?”

Marion smirks and decides to have mercy - and they don’t really have much time - and pushes two fingers into her trying to not moan. Natallia is just so _wet, warm,_ and _tight._ It’s her favorite part of her job, when she actually feels good doing her job and Natallia is one of the few that manages to make her feel this way. Marion kisses and bites her neck before she starts to move her hand.

Natallia is holding her shoulders so tightly that she thinks her nails may rip her shirt. And Marion doesn’t give a fuck. She feels her own arousal growing, which isn’t that common even with her favorite clients. It’s not comfortable, she wants to make Natallia cum as soon as possible just to have a moment alone and solve her growing wet problem.

“Come on, good girl,” she whispers, rubbing Natallia’s g-spot. “Cum for me.”

* * *

When they come back to the crowded festival, Dominick finds them in less than five minutes. She doesn’t look too happy, there’s a frown on her face and runs her fingers through her hair twice before getting close enough to talk to them.

“What did I tell you about _stinking_?” Dominick says, she keeps some distance and it does help in making her not seem as threatening as she actually is. “And you’re stinking too,”” she points at Marion.

“Hey, calm down.” Natallia says, putting herself between the captain and Marion in a subtle way.

“I’m calm,” she almost growls, Natallia makes sure Marion is fully behind her. Dominick takes a deep breath. “When it’s your heat?”

“In a couple of weeks, why?”

“Because you’re _stinking_ real bad.”

“You’re supposed to be attracted to it,” Natallia frowns and it’s kinda funny how she sounds offended.

“I’m not. Now, do something about this shit.”

“That’s rude,” and Marion almost says _and that’s safe_. “Very rude.”

“I always say you stink, just now you noticed?”

“I guess I thought you were teasing,” Natallia sounds smaller.

“I- whatever, just do something about your scent,” she looks above Natallia’s shoulder. “You, what’s your name?”

“You can call me Marion.”

“That’s a pretty name.”

“Thanks?”

She looks back at Natallia: “I’ll go buy snacks, you have half an hour.”

“Ok…”

Dominick turns and walks away with hurried long steps. This is probably one of the weirdest interactions she ever had with an Alpha. Natallia turns to her, still frowning.

“You still look offended.”

“I… it’s the first time I see an Alpha not being attracted to Omegas in pre-heat.”

“Maybe you’re not her type?”

“I’m an Omega, I’m _every_ Alpha _and_ Beta type!”

“Hey, it’s ok,” Marion puts her hands on Natallia’s shoulders. “ _You_ said she doesn’t want to marry, it’s probably just that.”

“Yeah, it probably is.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'll try to balance between Dominick's and Marion's POV, maybe I'll throw some Natallia's POV. I don't know if this will be a love triangle, poly relationship or what. Hope it doesn't bother you.


	3. III

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize in advance if my english is worse/weirder, I had a little home accident a few days ago and my brain is slower than normal.

To say that Dominick is _stressed_ is underestimating how she feels, every muscle of her body feels so tense that could be painful to move. She only has a few months until that stupid arranged marriage that _none of them_ wanted, only a few until she will have to mate a woman she feels no attraction to at all. Natallia _is_ objectively attractive, Dominick doesn't doubt it and she'll never disagree, but _she_ doesn't feel what she knows she's supposed to feel for her _fiance_ but there's basically nothing there. She will have to mate and knot that and get the Omega pregnant and she doesn't even know if she'll get _hard_. (Or get hard thinking about Natallia instead of Marion.)

Marion, the woman she has been having the hots for _months_. A prostitute that she should _despise_. And the woman who was fucking Natallia. Dominick knew Natallia has sexual adventures when she's in town for a couple of years now, the woman always goes out as much as possible and comes back stinking just like an Omega who had some great fucking. She's not that innocent, and she knew it was a female prostitute, she could smell those specific pheromones stuck on Natallia. She knew it has been the same person for at least a year now. But she didn’t expect to be someone she is also attracted to. There are so _many_ street workers, it had to be the same person?

Dominick isn't judging. Both were supposed to have sex with other people only during their mating cycles. Nobody really expects an elemental to stay a perfect virgin until their marriage, even if _officialy_ , all of them are virgins until they marry. Natallia has her heat partner, a Beta that Dominick knows nothing about and isn't interested in. Just like Natallia isn't interested in Dominick's rut partner.

Ava is one of the few people she manages to fuck without holding back 90% of her strength (only about 50%). It's one of the few people Dominick ever had sex at all (she can count one hand, actually, she's less promiscuous than every other Alpha of her division). Ava is the only Sigma Dominick knows and trusts enough to do this.

Sex with fellow Alphas can be fun, even if it can be weird and they always spend more time prepping for penetration than actually having sex, the same goes for Betas. It's _good_ sex, but not really helpful when she wants to use it as a way to blow off steam. It's good when she's just bored and wants to cum somewhere that is not her bathtub. But they're not a good option when she needs it quickly. She doesn't want an Omega and sex with humans is not safe at all (for the human, obviously).

So in the day following the Winter Festival, still thinking about Marion and Natallia (a lot more than she should, she's disgusted with herself with every time her brain tried to picture them together), she called Ava first thing in the morning. And Ava came to her like someone who needed that as much as she did. Dominick never asks, she usually just lets Ava in and goes along. But she asked this time, she _needed_.

(Natallia apparently went to prostitutes, maybe it just easier for her. The thing she uses to have sex can't _tear_ someone apart. Or go out making hybrid babies by accident. Dominick doesn't underestimate the woman's powers, but she also knows that it wasn't like Natallia could accidentally turn someone into a pile of ashes. The mere _idea_ of having sex with a human is scary.)

Ava is her go-to person so she's not even surprised by how fast Ava agreed. They're more colleagues with benefits than friends with benefits, they don't interact that much when they're not fucking. They established this years ago, still two cadets in the same team (since Ava's mother is a fire-powered elemental, most of her division is filled with fire-powered elementals or their hybrids). It was supposed to be about Dominick's rut but the sex was good enough to make Ava stick around to casual fucks.

"I have no idea how... how the fuck your mother thinks you're still a little virgin girl?" Ava asks while she enters Dominick's room.

"It's a facade, all elementals do it." She closes the door. "Thanks for coming."

"Thanks for calling." She's wearing loose pants and a coat, her hair still messy and it's obvious she worn the first thing she saw. "The most desired captain of this division called me to fuck, how am I supposed to refuse?"

"I woke you up," Ava rolls her eyes and throws her arms around Dominick's neck, Dominick's hands are on her waist in a second. "Also, you're quite desired too, first lieutenant Modred."

"Yeah, sure. You're taller."

"I'll stop growing up soon, I promise," she pulls Ava a bit closer. "But in my defense, not my fault you stopped growing at sixteen."

"Shut up. Did you call me to _fuck_ me or to _roast_ me?"

"Hey, I like teasing you. Y'know makes you fuck me harder."

"And you always complain about it."

"Because sometimes it seems you're trying to make my dick fall off."

"It's _your_ fault. But enough talk, come on."

She pulls Dominick down to kiss her, Dominick can feel the fresh taste of Ava's toothpaste. Ava moves her hands down from Dominick's neck, both hands stopping on her boobs and giving a good squeeze. She knows how Ava likes them, she's pretty sure that Ava spent more time touching and kissing them than touching other parts of her body. The Sigma moves her hands down again, but only to get to the hem of her shirt and sneak them under it. Her hands have a rougher texture like her own.

"Let's have some fun, then," Ava says. "I'll fuck you dry."

* * *

Dominick isn't surprised that Ava did exactly what she said she'd do. There's something weirdly _satisfying_ about being fucked until there's nothing left to cum. She's still trying to get rid of the heavy sex scent when a knock on her door almost makes her jump off her skin. _The fuck-_ she grunts. Nobody visits her, the only person that comes is Beau and her mother would never knock her door.

(And she knows Beau will only reprimand her about Natallia's sex scent _after_ the Omega is gone.)

"Uh, hi?" She asks, looking around to find her shorts because she really doesn't want to be naked in front of anyone.

"Dominick?" Natallia voice comes from outside.

 _Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck:_ "Wait a minute."

"... ok?"

The last person she expected to visit her was Natallia. The Omega _never_ visited her and Dominick was sure the woman didn't even know where her room is. Where her whole dorm is. She's wrong, apparently. Dominick puts herself into the shorts she was wearing previously and a long-sleeved shirt that reached her mid-tights (it's one of her favorite shirts). She tries to make sure that the sex scent isn't too heavy before opening the door.

"Hey, there," she steps aside. "Come in. Do you want some tea? Some water?" Something about having the Omega in her room after a morning like that one makes her nervous.

"No, thank you," Natallia says.

"Uh, you can sit..." she makes a face, noticing that the armchair is buried under clothes, both casual and uniform. "In the only free place."

"Uh, it's fine." She chooses to lean against the wall.

"Did I upset you? About the scent yesterday? I didn't mean to."

"I know you didn't, don't worry. I'm just surprised, I never met an Alpha who isn't attracted to pre-heat scent."

"Oh. Ok," Dominick checks the time, she knows that Natallia is ignoring the sex scent that still lingering despite how much she tried to get rid of it. "Don't worry about my future performance."

Natallia blushes visibly: "Thanks?"

"You're welcome. How's your hooker friend?"

"She's fine," Dominick looks at her with how the woman almost growled.

"No need to be so protective."

"She's my friend."

"Whatever you say. Don't worry, I won't hurt her."

"Hm, yeah, sure."

Dominick turns her head to her and the whole air feels heavier: "Who do you think I am? Be- My mother?"

"No, just... she's my friend, ok? I just care about her."

Dominick nods and tries to relax, Natallia didn't accuse her of anything. But she still knows that everyone knows how violent her mother can be – or they _almost_ know how violent she can be. _But she doesn't know me, she doesn't know anything about me._ And it's not like Natallia has zero reasons to think that Dominick wouldn't do anything to hurt Marion, since most Alphas are quite... possessive.

Dominick decides to not fall into this rabbit hole, sounds like seeking for conflict that she doesn't have time to.

"Do you have anything to do?" Dominick asks.

"Uh, no. Not really. Why?"

"Well, I have some demonstrations to do in the arena in about forty minutes. You can come if you want to."

"What kind of demonstrations?"

"Fire defense techniques for the new aspirants' team."

"Oh, sounds interesting."

"I'll put the armor, you can wait here if you want to."

* * *

Dominick noticed that Natallia seemed a bit impressed by the armor but didn't comment anything on their way to the arena. The training armor looks more like the battle armor than her regular uniform. Dominick would happily explain if Natallia asks (she'd explain for anyone who asks). She knows the Omega isn't interested, she's not a soldier and she's not trying to be friends with the Alpha. So they just walked together and Dominick pointed to a good spot, where she could see and hear and still be safe from the flames.

Dominick has no idea of why she's nervous about having Natallia watching her. A small part of her wants to _impress_ the Omega even if it doesn't make sense. She can feel Natallia's eyes on her back while she walks towards her superior and the group of youngsters. He's one of the few Omegas in this division and definitely the strongest she knows.

"Me and captain Thur will demonstrate different ways of defending yourself from flames," Major Dubh says to the group of aspirants, none of them seemed to be older than twelve. He lifts his hand with three fingers up: "Evasion, reflect and redirect."

Dominick knows that in a serious fight, she'd only have a chance against him because she's pretty good in defense techniques. In the end, there's a reason why she's a captain at twenty instead of a lieutenant like Ava. They walk towards the center of the arena and he nudges her arm before saying in a low voice:

"We're not doing the advanced redirection."

"Why, sir?" Major Dubh is almost her friend (she feels like their relationship is the same she has with Ava without the sex).

"A certain first-lieutenant was seen around your dorm a couple of hours ago," Dominick _tries_ to not blush. "I'm not judging, you're an Alpha, after all. I'm also not judging you bringing your fiance."

"S-she wanted to come."

"Again: not judging. This is just for your safety."

"Alright, thank you, sir."

He nods and they separate ways. They bow to each other before the demonstration begins. The major starts with the standard attacks, not as hard as he can go. Punches in the air spit fist-sized fireballs that fly in top speed towards his opponent. Smaller fire attacks are pretty easy to dodge, even for people with no training. She knows she doesn't even have to evade the best way she can, the armor is more than good enough to not let weak fireballs hurt her. A dual-punch attack is her cue to move to the next technique.

They're his next level attacks, dual-punches and she admires how easily he can control the strength behind his flames. She punches the fire that comes in her direction. The yellow flame curls around her fist for a moment before licking her forearm changing to orange. Before turning red, curling around her upper arm for a moment before dissipating and leaving nothing behind.

The group of aspirants gasps together, nudging each other, and murmurs of a surprise run through the group. Dominick thinks it's adorable, she remembers the first time she saw someone reflecting flames before, she barely could wait to be taught how to do it. The opportunity to teach is probably the only reason that even if she doesn't really want kids that badly, she hopes to have at least _one_ who inherits her powers.

The major offers bigger blasts, she feels the strength behind them burning on her shoulder. Just to show off a little bit, she lets a fire-punch or two hit her chest. Dominick sees Dubh rolling his eyes between punches when the flames involve her torso before dissipating in red on her back. They spend more time in this than in the evasion phase, they know children usually love to see yellow flames turning into red sparks.

Between hits, the major nods twice and she nods back.

_That's what I've been waiting for, kids, now you'll see what is actually impressive._

It's her favorite defense technique, in her opinion, the smartest way to defeat a stronger opponent. She never lost a duel when using it. The major spins and kicks a large fire-ball to her direction. It's almost white and she knows that to deflect it, she'd need both her hands. Part the ball in half, make around half of it go around her and dissipate in the air behind her.

But it's redirection time. When it's close enough, she backslaps the tip of the flame and it curls around her left arm. Still white while the flame moves to her back. Her favorite part of this method is the warmth that burns through her chest when part of the fire is absorbed by her. She groans when all of the fire is accumulated, it covers all the expanse of her back. With her right hand, she punches the air and all the fire runs around her arm, more yellow than white, and goes back hard towards Buhb. The major half deflects and half dodges, slapping the flames away and stepping aside at the same side.

The gasps of awe from the aspirants are louder, none of them holding back their surprise. Redirecting is not a method unheard of, just generally not seen. And most seem to be sure that only a very small group can do effective redirection of any element: "pure-blood" elementals. Children of a couple where both have the same elemental powers. (Something that Dominick had no idea was a belief until she was an aspirant and told that she shouldn't be able to do that).

The major kicks again, the flames are more orange, but the blast is larger and burns a bit more when she absorbs part of the blast. The fourth kick makes her take a couple of steps back to redirect it. The next blast is already in the way when the major stops because he noticed her stepping back. She reflects more than before and feels it burn when part of the white flame sneaks under her collar and it spreads down to the middle of her back.

"You ok there, captain?" He asks, a hint of worry on his voice.

"Yes, sir," she shakes off smoke rising from her left arm and shoulder. She ignores the sting on her back. 

He looks at her as someone who's sure she's not really ok. She _will_ be ok, fire burns are way less painful and scarring than ice burn. The major nods but don't ask any further before turning his attention to the aspirants and start explaining the reflecting method.

 _This could have been worse_ , she thinks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Writing in Dominick's POV is easier for some reason. Next chapter will probably be on her POV again or I'll try to write on Natallia's POV (I want it to be some hurt/comfort after Dominick got burn).
> 
> A quick note about the army ranking: it's the same as the Brazilian military police + 1 more rank position. The ranking list is: aspirant, second lieutenant, first lieutenant, captain, major, lieutenant-colonel, colonel and brigadier.


	4. IV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> this first scene was supposed to be short but it turned into around 2K of Natallia being a caretaker and being alone with Dominick for more than five minutes. cw for burns and scars.
> 
> _I hope this chapter is better (I mean, I'm in less pain, so... maybe it's readable.)_

Natallia never really  _ hated _ Dominick, she always hated the whole arranged marriage. Something that was their parents' choice and not theirs.

But she never felt interested in spending time with Dominick. Much less after she met Marion, she's not  _ in love _ with the woman, just very attracted to her. (It's really hard to not be attracted to her.) And she shouldn't feel so... offended just because Dominick isn't attracted to her pre-heat scent, which isn't the worst that could happen. (Having a child with her powers instead of Dominick's is probably a lot worse.)

So she's not 100% sure why she accepted following the woman, watch the presentation to the aspirants.

Watching elementals using their powers is usually interesting. Natallia only saw Dominick using her abilities to keep things warm. Not too obvious, but she noticed that during those tense encounters between their parents and they had to be around, her cup of tea wouldn't get colder even after two hours.

_ You're gonna marry her and you don't even know how powerful she is? _ Watching could be useful in the future. She takes mental notes on how fast she is, and how pretty flames can be while changing colors, blinding yellow and dangerous red. But redirection seems too dangerous.

And she isn't wrong - Natallia has some good instincts about bad ideas, even if it doesn't mean she always listens to it and still making terrible decisions. Maybe Dominick makes worse decisions because she knows there's no way she didn't get burned during the last two hits. Natallia isn't admitting that she feels some relief when the presentation is fully over and Dominick walks away.

Dominick isn't  _ that _ much taller than her, only a few inches. But she's the  _ never-ending legs _ kind of tall person. So Natallia needs to jog after her to catch up with the Alpha's long strides. She notices that the woman is much paler than she noticed in the distance, swaying a bit on her feet as someone who drank too much wine. Her short hair was messier than Natallia noticed, and was matted with sweat. And if she squints a bit, she can see scorch marks in the dark crimson of her armor collar. The visible skin in the back of her neck is in a furious red.

"Are you ok?"

"Yes."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah."

She doesn't believe for a second.

Natallia admits to herself: she doesn't know how much other elementals are resistant to injuries caused by their element. And much less when they're mixed like Dominick. She remembers being told that Beau is a pure-blood, Deniece wasn't, their daughter being a fire-elemental Alpha was against the odds. Maybe it affects how resistant she is to get burn.

Natallia is used to these visits every few months. One of her earliest clear memories is meeting Dominick. The five-year-old child with odd ice blue eyes and fire reddish-brown hair. But even with this being a regular thing for so long, due to her lack of interest, she never tried to learn anything. And Dominick didn't either.

"Are you finished?"

"Leave," she says hoarsely, Natallia doesn't know if it's the pain of the acid on her throat.

"No. Are you done or not?" Dominick stays quiet for a couple of minutes, Natallia almost asks again.

"I think so."

"Right, time to get rid of this armor."

She closes the toilet lid before flushing and starts working on partially undress Dominick. The training armor is similar enough to the battle armor for Natallia to know how to take it off. She notices how tight it is, made to mold around the soldier's body. Maybe it's supposed to avoid flames from sneaking under the armor, even if it didn't work so well this time. She notices how heavy the plates are, maybe part of a soldier's fitness is meant to carry the heavy armor with ease. She grunts when she tries to start pulling the chest/back piece.

"How...?"  _ She must be in a lot of pain to take this long to notice I'm taking her armor off _ , she thinks while looking at the confusion on Dominick's face.

"I come from a family of doctors, I know the basics."

"Oh."

The undershirt is... pretty much  _ gone _ . Both sleeves almost completely burn, shoulders too and only the hem still there on the back. Her arms seem to be covered in first degree burns, her shoulders look worse and her back too. It's covered in different degrees of burns, the worse on her shoulder blades. She notices the burn seemed to follow her spine and spread from it. Turning into almost imperceptible on her lower back.

(She wonders if it's how fire redirection works: a hand, follow their spine to leave on the via other hand and maybe one of the feet.)

Carefully, she uses scissors to cut what is needed to get rid of it. Pulling out the shirt, what's left of the chest binding falls too. Her whole face burns even if Dominick is far from the first person she sees like this, but still feels... weird. Dominick still slow, distracted by something in the ceiling and she looks at Natallia, probably feeling the heat coming from her redded face.

"Sorry," Natallia mutters, she forgot they should be there and would be burned too.

"I'm a soldier, most of the division saw me shirtless," her voice sounds empty. "Just don't..."

"Stare?"

"Yes."

"Family of doctors, you're not the first. Let's get you into the bathtub so I can clean you up. Keep your briefs, if you want to."

"Would be nice."

Natallia nods, the lower part of the armor is considerably lighter, seems more flexible. It's hard to help Dominick up and to the bathtub, both because she's pretty heavy (no surprise there) and there's no way to hold her arms without touching the burned skin. Dominick doesn't need to be told to try to leave space between her and the bathtub. Dominick seems to hold onto the edges with all strength left, wincing a bit with how her muscles moved under pained skin.

Natallia isn't as efficient as other people from a doctors' family. She probably should have trained more, be more of a doctor could be very handy for someone who's supposed to marry a soldier. She never expected that the first time spending more than five minutes alone with Dominick would include trying to take care of her.

They stay silent while they wait for the bathtub to fill a bit. Natallia watches the water to not stare the woman. She's not surprised by her clear muscular form, the guard uniform doesn't do anything to hide the guardsmen's bodies. It's also standard for Alphas. Scars aren't a surprise either, from burns and cuts. And from ice-burns that she won't ask about now.

Dominick breathes a bit harder when the water level reaches her lower back and touches the lowest burn. Natallia waits for the water to rise a bit more before turning the faucet off. She notices she didn't have anything to take water and clean the woman and she didn't want to make Dominick submerge in cold water.

"Too cold?"

"N-no," she answers between teeth.

"I'll get a mug, or a cup, wait here."

Dominick huffs and mutters something. She opens all the cabinets before finding cups and mugs, mostly mugs, and grabs the largest she could find. She also grabs the only towel visible, surprised by how fluffy it is. And large, probably enough to be wrapped around Dominick. Why the woman had one of those when she could warm herself enough to get dry before stepping out of the tub is a new mystery.

Back in the bathroom, she lets the towel on the sink. She kneels beside the tub again and starts her task. Arms first, they seem to be already healing, less red than a few minutes ago.  _ Well, good thing she starts to heal as soon as she's not cooking inside her armor _ , she thinks. She does as quickly as possible, moving to her shoulders.

"Try to relax a little bit," Natallia says, focused on her shoulders and ignoring the number of hickeys trailing down her chest,  _ no judging, I have a bunch of those too _ . "You need to breath."

"Hm," Natallia looks up, Dominick's has a small frown, but is keeping her face as neutral as possible. "I don't like this."

"I could've taken you to the infirmary if you hadn't collapsed in your bathroom. Or it would be less bad if you had gone there right after you got burned instead of trying to turn yourself into some juicy cooked Alpha."

Dominick turns her head aways and she's close enough to see faded ice-burn scars: "I didn't know it was this bad."

"And how's that even possible?" Natallia moves so she can start working on Dominick's back., starting from her lower back.

"I always feel burned when I work with flames."

"Is that normal?"

"No."

"Does it has anything to do with your mom?"

"Mother," she adds before Natallia asks: "Beau is my mother, Deniece was my mom."

"Oh," Natallia answers softly. "Sorry. Does it has anything to do with your mother?"

"Probably."

She slowly moves up, she definitely doesn't like the texture of recently burned flesh: "Am I asking too much?"

"No."

"Really?"

"Yes," she shrugs but moans in pain after. "You don't need to try distracting me, but I appreciate the effort."

"I'm not trying to distract you," she doesn't need to see her face to know that Dominick doubts, she looks anyway and can't see much from behind, her eyes focus on the faded scars. "You think I hate you."

"Don't you?"

"Should I?"

"I just never met an Omega that didn't hate the Alpha they were forced to marry to."

"Forced is a strong word."

"Wouldn't you run away if you could? With Marion, it's my bet."

"Would you run away?"

"Talking is distracting you."

"No, it's not."

"Then why your hands aren't moving?" Natallia looks down to see that her hand has stopped in one of the un-burned spots.

"Sorry," she resumes her cleaning.

"I'm not complaining," Dominick almost hisses when Natallia is touching burned skin again.

She almost offers to talk more, but she reaches the middle of Dominick's back, where the burns are worse. Dominick's hands grip the bathtub edges almost as if she's trying to transfer her pain to the object. She tries to clean as fast as possible, the skin feels  _ wrong _ under her fingertips. Colder than the rest of her body, she starts to tremble a bit when Natallia's fingers the spot that seemed to be the source of most pain.

"I'll wash your hair too, ok?"

Dominick nods. How short her hair is helps a lot, Dominick keeps herself as still as possible when the water with shampoo touches her back. Natallia makes extra sure that there's no soap on her skin when she's done washing her hair.

"I'll grab... shorts or briefs?"

"Shorts."

Natallia nods and goes after it. She's used to Dominick wearing her uniform and formal clothes, and when it's a more informal outfit, jeans and sweatshirts. No skin being shown. She didn't see much skin before this noon. Now she saw Dominick virtually naked. She goes back and does her best to help Dominick out of the tub, she feels how warmer Dominick is for a moment before groaning in pain.

Dominick leans against the sink, trembling more now that she's on her feet. With all the care she could, Natallia helps her start to dry herself with the towel.

"Do you want help with the shorts?"

"No."

"No as in  _ yes, I can do it by myself _ or no as in  _ I don't want to make you uncomfortable because I'm hung _ ?"

"I- I'm not that big," she blushes violently.

"Sure. Can you do it alone or you just don't want to make me uncomfortable? Or yourself uncomfortable?"

"I can do it."

"Call if you need help, I'll be right outside the door."

Dominick nods. Natallia leans against the wall beside the door after shutting it close. The doctor side in her, the caretaking instincts that run in her family's blood and isn't weaker in members that aren't caretakers, doesn't like the idea of leaving Dominick alone for so long. She can hear the hard breaths and the little grunts.

She feels a wave of relief when Dominick finally gets out of the bathroom. She looks so much  _ smaller _ and  _ younger _ when she's wrapped by the fluffy towel. And looks tired and sleepy too, maybe her body is barely strong enough to keep her awake while it tries to heal the burns. Dominick frowns but doesn't say anything when Natallia holds her covered arm with a hand and puts her other hand on the small of her back before guiding her to the bed.

Natallia almost growls at her when Dominick makes herself fall face-first on the bed, then the Alpha groans a bit while crawling to make herself a bit more comfortable. And does growl when Dominick puts a bit of a fight when Natallia pulls the towel.

"You'll get overheated. Do you have any medicine for this?"

"No," she buries her face into the pillow. A moment passes: "Why you're doing this?"

"Family of doctors."

"You're not a doctor."

"I know," Natallia isn't sure what she should do now. The first care is easy, but the rest is never her responsibility. She starts to turn she should call someone from the infirmary to check on the woman. "I... I'll get going now."

"No, wait," she lifts her head, moaning with pain again. "Could... could you stay until I fall asleep? Then you go get someone from the infirmity if that's not too much to ask."

"No, it's not. I can stay."

"Thank you."

* * *

It didn't take five minutes for Dominick to fall asleep. And0 Natallia stayed for longer than needed, but she couldn't not stare for a minute.  _ Can you believe you'll marry and mate her in a few months? _ She asked herself. She had to leave before she started to feel creepy by watching someone sleeping. Even if this someone is her future wife.

Natallia is a predictable woman, she stops briefly at the infirmary before going after Marion.

She wanders around on Marion's spot for almost an hour before she sees Marion walking closer. Assuming by how tired she looks, Natallia knows she was with one of those  _ terrible  _ clients that just ask too much and don't pay enough. A small smile forms on her face when she sees Natallia, it's adorable. They communicate silently and the Omega follows her without hesitation. 

"How's your day going?" Natallia aks, putting her arms around Marion's waist as soon as they're in the 'safety' of a dark alley.

"THe same daily bullshit, I should stick to one continuous shift," she answers and put her arms around Natallia's neck. "Your?"

"Fine, I guess."

"You look worried."

"I'm not  _ worried, _ " she mumbles.

"I'm not judging. You don't have to tell me if you're not comfortable talking about it."

Natallia sighs and leans back, the wall behind her is cold enough to let her feel the lack of heat through her coat: "Dominick got hurt."

"Oh, how?"

"One of those elemental presentations. She got burned."

"Isn't she a fire-elemental?"

"Nobody is 100% immune to their elements., that's why we need to train., even when we're not interested in using them."

"Makes sense, I guess."

"I won't bore you with how this shit works, don't worry."

"I'm glad you won't," she closes the rest of the gap still between them. "I can help you relax."

"I..." it's a bit hard to concentrate when Marion is so close. "I was thinking we could grab something to eat."

As if it knows that it's good to emphasize her words, her stomach growls, and Marion giggles: "Alright, a break would be good. Also, I'm hungry too."

Marion grabs her wrist and starts to drag her. Elementals in general, or the ones that live around Natallia, aren't real fans of physical contact. Elders that told her Omegas shouldn't be touched by anyone but close other Omega relatives and their Alpha (and only  _ after  _ the marriage, mating should be the first contact with an Alpha). She tries to follow this when at home just to avoid conflict - and having a heat partner is more of a secret than it is for Alphas with rut partners.

But she doesn't need to do it with Marion (and she's glad that Dominick just doesn't care about it), she doesn't even care if all this open contact is more from her work than affection. Still something that makes her feel happily warm.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I tried my best to write in her POV, maybe three POVs is too much. is it? and sorry about the last chapter.


	5. V

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dominick has a nightmare, some tense conversation with Natallia and Dominick is stubborn. CW for past abuse, also some more whumpy content.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> title changed from _can you feel the fire?_ to _let me light your fire, let me turn you on_.

_ Everything is wrong. _

_ The world isn't moving, she isn't breathing, she can feel the burn of crying fire on her mouth. If she focuses enough, she's sure she will hear her voice still echoing throughout the mansion. But she can't breathe, she doesn't know if the ice is really freezing under her skin or it's just too cold and it feels like it's finding its way under her skin. The woman pokes her forehead and she thinks she may break apart as a statue hit hard enough. _

_ "Oh, little cub," she hears through the ice, she can feel it starting to freeze her core. Trying to take away the only thing she had. "It's adorable that you think you could defeat me. It's a shame nobody loves you to appreciate your determination." _

_ The cold is crushing and cutting and killing the heat. All she can do is try and try and try to scream. Try to use whatever is left to cry fire again and get out of this. But it feels like she's screaming more in pain than to set herself free. _

_ She keeps screaming, the cold on her back burns. _

_ She keeps screaming, louder and louder and she can feel different scents that don't belong in the ice. _

She keeps screaming when someone warm holds her shoulders, she jumps and falls in the hard cold ground. The world is moving too fast and the air is too hot.

"Captain, hey, Captain Thur," warm hands on her shoulders, and she can't breathe with the ice on her back. "Dominick."

She blinks and tries to think. Still disoriented. The hands move from her shoulder to under her arms and she's moving away from the ice. 

"Doc?" She mumbles.

"Yeah, it's me," he guides her – or drags gently – to the bed. "It's alright, you're safe."

She frowns and blinks and things start to get back in their places inside her mind. She recognizes she's in her room, in the dorm, and her back hurts from getting hurt. She mentally curses herself, she should know the difference between fire just touching her and it burning.

"Ms. Coppens went to the infirmary, they sent a nurse and he had to call me. They're not trained for this kind of burn."

She frowns: "It's that bad?"

"Could be worse. But it's specific to advanced fire redirection, it's not common enough to be worth training."

"But... But I wasn't doing the advanced redirection."

"You know how the armor works, right?"

"Yes. I just thought that there wasn't fire enough to escape."

"There wasn't because you absorbed it. Not on purpose, I know, that's probably why it burned you instead of getting out. It explains why it burned your arms and why it spreads from your spine down your back."

"Oh…" if she focuses, she can feel it burning more down her spine. "Is it too bad?"

"Could be worse," he says, taking the pomade that fell from his hands when Dominick jumped out of the bed.  _ Oh, that's the cold _ . "I'm sorry, I should've woke you up."

"It's ok," she answers, laying on her stomach again. "Just do the thing."

"Ok. You'll need to rest for at least two weeks."

" _ Two weeks _ ?"

"Yes.  _ Two  _ weeks. You got hurt quite badly, Dominick," she forces herself to not wince when he touches her with the cold pomade. "Your arms will be fine by tomorrow, fully healed in two or three days. But your back will take a while, especially here," he delicately rubs the spot under her neck. "Your uniform will make the burns worse and delay your healing."

"But…"

"You won't die if you give yourself time to heal." 

* * *

Part of Dominick doesn't like the medicine she's given, makes the pain get better,  _ yes _ , but makes her sleepy. She doesn't even notice when she falls asleep. Not long after another  _ exhausting  _ conversation with her mother. Because if Dominick isn't good at what made her a captain, she's not good at anything and Beau has been right all along.

She wakes up from her nap by Natallia's scent, it's stronger now than it was the day before. She's sure that if the omega doesn't leave in a couple of hours, she'll go into heat before she's home and with her beta partner. Dominick turns, she can already see how close Natallia is of her cycle. The faint blush on her cheeks, the aura of disruption around her of someone who's currently warmer than normal. Being in Dominick's room probably doesn't help, it has no sex scent anymore, smells more like the herbs used to help her burns than Dominick (and she wonders if the cold scent is detectable for her), but still not the ideal place.

"How are you feeling?" Natallia asks, she's clearly uncomfortable.

"I'm fine," she sits up, holding the light blanket up to her chin, more to make Natallia less uncomfortable than her own preference.

"Are you sure?"

"Why?"

Natallia answers by stepping closer, a sudden movement that makes Dominick almost flinches back. Natallia holds her chin and tilts her head upward slightly, she forgot about it. The slap was hard enough to cause that annoying ear ringing and make her taste blood. But she doesn't why Natallia is reacting like this, the visits have been consistent for years, she had to  _ know _ . 

"You didn't have a busted lip this morning."

"I have bruises and busted lip all the time," how soft Natallia's hands feel almost  _ wrong. _

"You were supposed to be resting," she's sure Natallia can feel how tense she is, her jaw clenching and moving even if the omega didn't let her go. "Not getting your fucking face busted."

"Oh, yeah, because I went out there and asked someone to punch me," she pushes Natallia hand away. "You know  _ nothing. _ "

"You don't have to be rude."

"Then shut the fuck up," she has no idea  _ why _ Natallia's scent is making her angrier. "I can barely walk, do you really think I went out there to get punched?"

"Well, getting into fights is a very alpha thing to do."

"And being so unobservant is a very omega thing to do?" Natallia frowns. "You should be already leaving, I'm pretty sure you don't want to have your heat before you're home."

"I'm just worried you're doing shit when you're supposed to be resting."

"I didn't do shit.

"Busted lip."

" _ I didn't do shit _ , I was just reprimanded."

"What kind of reprimand is this? Hitting injured soldiers sounds like unfair  _ punishment _ ."

"It's the parental reprimand."

"Your  _ mom _ hit you?"

"My  _ mother _ ," she almost growls. "And yes, you… didn't you notice how much she hates me?"

"I guess I just thought it was that tension between adult alphas. I mean, you're her pup."

"I was my mom's pup, I'm Beau's defective spawn."

"You're not- you're not  _ defective _ ."

"If you never noticed it was raw  _ hatred  _ and not just normal tension, I don't think you can say if I am or not defective."

"Dominick…"

"Why are you interested in me now?"

"We're going to marry."

"We were arranged to marry before I was born, you're twenty years late."

"You didn't show interest either."

"Would you have given me attention if I did?" Her silence is enough to answer her question. "It doesn't really matter. You should get going, you don't want to have your heat on your trip, do you?"

"No, no, I don't," she steps back. "I just… I just wanted to talk."

"We will have time enough to talk  _ a lot _ once we get married."

* * *

He said  _ two weeks _ . But Dominick isn't a very obedient person – she is, actually, but not when she doesn't want to waste time. The uniform feels heavier and tighter than normal, she can feel the roughness even with the dressing covering her burns and the undershirt. Two layers of thick fabric and she still feels the uniform rough against sensitive skin. A constant reminder of the  _ Beau's defective spawn _ that she usually ignores, buried under everything. Locked in a box that she can't open or years of constructed stability would break apart.

Dominick's shifts are always calm. The worst that happens is the number of underage sex workers that she has to pretend she doesn't see, it's not part of her job. (She has to ignore a lot of things, to be honest, from the underage workers to shady security to alleged gangs) And  _ she's already bad at her job.  _ Dominick shakes her head, even with the growing throbbing headache. She isn't sure if it's the insistent pain on her back or the excess of obsessive thoughts about her mother.

Her shifts are always calm.

Except when she needs them to be.

She heard the commotion, the yell and curses between two male voices. She rolls her eyes, it sounds a lot like two men fighting over who will get the sex worker first. She jogs towards the sound, an alleyway that technically isn't part of her route, but she gets there first anyway. 

Or almost there, she almost collides with Marion, who's clearly moving away from the problem. A boy behind her who seems scared and thin enough to probably be new meat around. He's holding onto her forearm for dear life, Dominick immediately smells his scent of distress, and he smells like a beta. Dominick is aware of experienced workers having always one or two newbies following them around.

"You should get back," Marion says to her. "You don't wanna get between Tornados and Fire-Criers. Turn around."

"Wait, why were you around gang members?"

"They're not  _ gangs _ . They're just… underground groups. Just move, you fucking oaf."

"Whatever. I have a job to do," she tries to pass beside Marion, the woman pushes her back with more force than she expected for a small woman. "What the-  _ what are you doing _ ?"

"A little bird told me you almost turned into a crisp. The same little bird would like to not be a widow before she gets married, so I was trying to stick around your route. But, like I said:  _ you don't wanna get between Tornados and Fire-Criers _ ."

Dominick frowns, not expecting that, even if Marion is still sounding somewhat hostile. She looks between the pair in front of her and the source of sounds. The yells are getting louder and angrier. She's not hearing any other soldier come around, she knows most of them don't really follow their route fully. They stay in the same spots, it doesn't make much difference. Where you don't have soldiers, you have members of one of the "underground groups".

She's about to turn and leave when the fire comes. A long strip of red fire that is clearly a poorly made fire-punch.

"Alright, the elemental bullshit started, we better leave now," Marion says. " _ We _ does include you, giant child."

"Sure, whatever."

She tries to pass again, this time more prepared for Marion's attempt to stop her. As strong as Marion is, Dominick still taller and heavier too. She hears Marion mumble a string of curses, she wasn't aware of how many words you can use to call someone a  _ giant stupid alpha _ . Then the woman just grunts something about not wanting to watch someone getting murdered and starts to walk away, dragging the young boy with her. 

"Is there a problem here?"

She asks with her best  _ alpha voice that isn't quite her alpha voice.  _ It booms into the alleyway, words crystal clear but in an almost guttural grown. The two men's attention is hers now. One doesn't seem to be older than 20, the other seems to be over 50. The older is holding his left arm, his dirty white shirt sleeve is ripped and she can see red burned skin between his fingers. She assumes he's the Tornados guys, considering he's the burned one and that the younger man is wearing an older version of her battle armor. Nobody knows how the Fire-Criers got those armors, but she knows her armor is the third generation after the one he's wearing. 

"Nothing to see here, bastard," the younger man does a fire-kick, the red ball flies towards her, she easily dodges.

"You need more training," she comments, she knows it's not red because he's holding back or is weak, it's the armor.

"Shut up," a double punch, she reflects with a small wrist motion. The fire that touches the back of her finger is colder than the sparkles she coughs.

"A lot more training."

He looks like he barely trained with the armor, he probably just trained the motions, not the flames. He doesn't know how to control his expressions either, clearly surprised by how she reflected the fire. She rolls her eyes, she's on the quadrant patrolled by the fire-elementals squadron. She's wearing a fire-elementals squadron uniform. She knows she smells like a fire-elemental. 

(But people still see her eyes before everything and assume she's ice.) 

But he recovers from his surprise quickly. The older man sees it coming first, he crunches down, making himself as small as possible, a second before the boy starts his attack. He's quick in putting himself in a front stance and attacking with a stream of fire instead of a punch. Not knowing how long he'll hold the steam, she opts for not trying redirection. Dominick puts her hands together, palm against palm and fingertips pointing to the boy. Her hands cut through the fire, the flames curl around her forearms and dissipate right before her elbows, some sparkles take longer and reach up to her shoulder.

She can feel how his armor is making the flames weaker, it's a distinct feeling of fire being artificially filtered.

Dominick separates her hands and points her palms to him, he can't see it through his red wall. She knows it's a bad idea, but it's also not the worst. She let it in, the fire sneaks under her sleeves instead of running above it. It's a good warmth until it reaches her shoulder, she feels it burning until it reaches her spine and then it's hellfire until it reaches her tail bone. She's sure she's making her burns worse, but she doesn't care.

They stay like this for almost seven minutes.

When the boy is too tired to continue, he loses his stance for a moment and it's time enough for her to counter-attack. She feels all the fire she absorbed raging on her chest, begging to be set free. Then she sets it free, a red fireball is shot out of her closed fist. The ball hits the boy's chest and throws him several feet away.

"You can go, sir," she tells the man, he looks confused. "Just go before I change my mind."

He nods and leaves as fast as she can, Dominick calmly strides towards the boy. He doesn't seem to be older than her, the armor is ill-fitting, probably made for someone considerably taller. Dominick improvised a lantern, a small yellowish ball of fire floating over her open palm, so she can see him better. The arm's and chest's insignias were scraped off, the Fire-Criers symbol – a symbol that fits well with the name, a profile generic face with curly flames coming from its mouth – was carved onto the chest plate. 

Dominick crouches a couple of feet away. 

"You're quite a troublemaker, aren't you?"

"Fuck off, alpha," she rolls her eyes, she heard between soldiers that alpha/betas versus omegas/sigmas is a thing between those 'underground' groups.

"What's your name?"

"None of your fucking business."

"Yes, it is. You attacked a soldier  _ and  _ you're wearing stolen military gear."

"It's  _ mine _ ," he growls.

"Still stolen military gear, and vandalized gear with an "underground group" symbol. You're in big trouble."

"Good luck taking me to your dungeon," he gets up and she follows him.

"It's just a prison cell. We know you're a criminal."

"You're not taking me."

He throws the largest ball he can right at her face and takes off. She absorbs it, it's a lot more painful, even if it's not big after he spent most of his energy on the stream of fire. She doesn't waste time before using his fire against him. Looks almost like a liquid while traveling towards him, but takes a more solid form as soon as part of the fire wraps itself around his ankles and she pulls back. The fire around him is shaped like shackles and the line connecting it to her hands is shaped vaguely like chains.

"What the-"

"You're going to jail, boy," she walks closer, he looks almost like a child with the surprise in his eyes. "Outlaws have their own rare technique, even if I doubt you can cry fire. Law enforcers also have their own techniques."

Keeping the chain firm is using all the energy left on her. Hearing the steps of at least three fellow soldiers is enough to keep her going for time enough. She quickly hands the boy to them, glad that she doesn't need to carry him. They exchange formalities before she can get away.

She's not surprised when she takes a turn and finds Marion.

"I thought I told you to stay away from them," it's the first thing Marion says, Dominick rolls her eyes.

"Don't you have a client or something?" She keeps walking and the woman quickly starts to follow her.

"Babysitting duty," she points at the boy, who's still holding her forearm. "He's a very clingy child."

"He shouldn't be here."

"Not everyone is as privileged as you."

"That's not what I meant."

"Whatever. You look pale."

"I  _ am  _ pale."

"No. It looks like you'll be sick."

"Yeah, I know, that's why I'm trying to get there," she points at the guard booth around five hundred meters away.

Dominick knows she's swaying on her walk, her head is spinning and her back is hurting badly enough to make breathing hard.  _ Just a little more, come on,  _ she mentally tells herself. Her stomach isn't happy either, she gulps multiple times to stop herself from dry-heaving. 

"Hey,  _ don't you dare to faint here.  _ We're almost there," Marion grabs her forearm. "Come on, captain."

"I won't faint."

"You look like you will."

Dominick doesn't answer, all her energy is in putting a foot in front of the other.  _ Keep moving. Keep walking. You're almost there. Keep moving. Keep walking.  _ It feels like her skin is tightening around her chest. It takes all she has to get to the guard booth, her hands are shaking when she grabs the doorknob. Dominick falls on the closest chair, as uncomfortable as it is and even if she wanted to throw up. Moving again isn't an option and she can feel how her body feels colder and things are getting darker.

"I thought you said you wouldn't faint," her brain barely registers the voice. "I didn't sign up for  _ this _ shit."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> you know chapter 3' pre-smut scene? here is the long explicit version of that: [colleagues with benefits](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26183947)
> 
> I also hope you like whump, or don't mind it, this will be more whumpy than smutty. I won't kill characters, just hurt them very badly (Dominick, I'll hurt Dominick). And Natallia will be only mentioned for a while.


	6. VI

For someone who doesn't shy away from voicing negative opinions about elementals and hybrids, Marion certainly sounds hypocritical.

Her landlord is married to an elemental, even if as far as she knows, his spouse doesn't even use her powers. She only met her a couple of times, probably the scariest elemental she ever met. Not tall and muscular like Dominick, actually she seems to have the same built as Marion. But  _ something  _ about her scares Marion to the core. Maybe the constant heat, the mask her face (nobody never mentions why she wears the mask, but Marion is one of those who think she may have a burn scar), or how she moves like a predator. Or maybe the not so hidden fact that she has connections with the Fire-Criers. 

What makes it…  _ complicated  _ to have an alpha around. 

(It's dangerous for Marion, it's even more dangerous for Dominick. Marion doesn't like alphas as in _ I don't want one inside me _ . The Fire-Criers don't like alphas as in  _ I want to burn them into ashes _ .)

Her favorite client, another elemental to confirm she's a hypocritical woman, asked her to keep an eye on her chill alpha fiancee. Natallia apparently knew Marion could be easily around Dominick to check on her (after all, she doesn't really have a route to follow, even if she stays in the same general territory).  _ As if I can do anything to help a fucking alpha.  _ An alpha who's currently sleeping on her couch, so still that the only sign that she's not dead is the constant heat coming from her body and her shoulders moving slowly.

It was hard to carry her, even with the boy's help, the soldier is still heavier than any other person Marion had to carry. Carrying a mostly unconscious brick wall wasn't easy, Dominick was a mountain of muscles. But she did tell Natallia she would keep an eye on her, Marion liked to keep her word. She wasn't sure how a  _ fire-elemental  _ could get badly burned, but she wasn't sure how the powers worked anyway. It wasn't as if she had some formal education on the topic or tried to learn. But apparently, Dominick could get hurt by her own element and Marion won't think too much. 

Dominick seems very out of place in her apartment, which is pretty much a bathroom, a ridiculously small kitchen, and a room that was both her bedroom and the living room, and the dining room. The only chair around is used as her wardrobe and her couch is also her bed. A very small bed, a 2-person sofa that is small even for her. She doesn't mind living in such a small apartment (she knows motel rooms that are larger than her teeny tiny living place), it's what she can afford and it's enough for one person. 

(And  _ maybe  _ those connections that the landlord wife supposedly has may help with feeling safe.)

How small the place it makes it almost comical to have someone like Dominick there, sleeping on her couch like an adult in a child's bed. Marion took off her boots and jacket before letting Dominick lay on the couch. She didn't expect the boots to be that heavy, and the jacket to be that thick and rough inside. She wonders if there's some kind of protective layer on her clothes. The boots are a lot heavier than she expected, Marion can't say she really gets how the soldiers seemed to do kicking tricks with anchors on their feet. Marion knows nothing about the mechanics of controlling fire, or controlling any other element, even if she already noticed that most elemental soldiers don't wear gloves, the ones who wear, they're always with fingerless gloves. Dominick doesn't wear, and she saw how red her hands looked like. 

(But in those hours she has been sleeping, the redness subdued and Marion is almost sure Dominick heals astronomically faster than a human.) 

She also noticed how  _ young  _ Dominick is. Shouldn't be a surprise, but it is for some reason. Like most soldiers Marion knows, Dominick always has this almost angry expression, it seems to scream  _ I'm dangerous.  _ Even out of duty, the expression had almost no change and she kept the rigid posture. But sleeping on Marion's couch, she looks less like a soldier and more like a person. Not relaxed, Marion isn't sure if she subconsciously knows she isn't really in a safe place or if she just never fully relaxes. Still, she seems to be less tense enough to look like her actual age. 

The sun hasn't risen yet when Marion sits down with a bowl of noodles, it's the only food she has and it's both too early to go buy anything and she doesn't want to leave Dominick alone, she doesn't know what a fire-elemental could do if they wake up in an unknown place. Since she started breaking her shifts in two blocks, she sleeps in naps and she's glad about it. She doesn't feel like she lost precious sleep hours to keep an eye on a sleeping woman. 

She's halfway into her noodles, distracted with the food when she hears a sharper breath and the sound the couch makes under someone's shifting weight. She looks up to see Dominick turning her head and taking a second to sit up, she sniffs the air for a second before her eyes find Marion. She blinks and there's pure confusion on her face for only a second.

"Hello, captain."

"I- uh. Hello," she frowns and adjusts her posture to a more soldier-like position, it's obvious she's hiding some pain. "What… what happened?"

"You fainted, I couldn't leave you alone in that random guard booth, so I brought you here."

"Alone?"  _ So she's aware of how fucking heavy she is _ .

"My trainee helped."

"Oh," she nods slowly, looking down and conferring her hands, they seem to be shaking slightly now. "Why are you training a beta boy?"

"That's none of your business," she doesn't seem fazed by the hostility.

"Hm, should I, uh pay you?" Marion observes her as she digs her pockets and gets a few coins. "Should I?"

"First, Natallia already paid me. Second, this doesn't even pay a  _ handjob _ ." 

"Oh…" she frowns and her cheeks start to blush. "Sorry? I'm not… I don't really have money." 

"Aren't you, like, rich?" Marion may have  _ zero _ interest in elementals families and politics, but the  _ Thur  _ name is known. I mean, there's a  _ giant mansion  _ named after the family. 

"Yes, no, kinda. My mother is rich, I don't have access to any of that until I get married. No elemental has access to family money until they marry, actually." 

"Natallia seems to have." 

"Not directly, her parents give her money."

"Yours don't?"

"No."

"But you have a job tho." 

"Any payment actually goes to living quarters, food, medical care, clothes, training, everything." 

"So… you're pretty much poor?"

"Yes."

"That's… not what I expected, " she eyes the coins Dominick is holding. "Where you got this?"

"Not every soldier is an elemental or live in the dorms, we do favors for money?" Her mind went directly to  _ sexual  _ favors, technically prostitution? "Usually things like polishing armors and cleaning rooms. Or cooking or sparring sessions." 

_ Oh, good,  _ she doesn't know why the idea of soldiers exchange sexual favors bothers her: "That's a low price tho." 

"I expended what I had at the Winter Festival. Pretty sure that what I had would be enough to pay a full night with you," Marion doubts. "Not that I would, I know you're not offering. You wouldn't. I- You got what I mean."

Marion almost giggles, Dominick is fully red now: "I'm expensive, kid."

"I assumed it." 

"It's even more expensive for alphas." 

"Always is."

"So you know things." 

"I assume them. Fun fact, I have a brain."

"That's not common for your kind," comes out less light than expected, but Dominick doesn't seem to mind. "Anyhow, you should get going. You actually shouldn't be here."

"Well,  _ you  _ brought me here."

"I was paid to keep an eye on you, it's  _ your  _ fault you get yourself wasted. By the way, how the fuck a  _ fire- _ elemental get burned? And gets that tired that fast? Thought you had stamina."

"It's just a defect," she gets up, Marion follows her because the woman is  _ tall  _ and she doesn't want neck pain from looking up.

"Wait,  _ what _ ?"

"It's. Just. A. Defect. And I'm still healing, so a large part of my energy is on that."

Marion frowns: "I wasn't expecting it."

"What? The defect?" She takes her jacket that Marion had folded and left on top of her own pile of clothes. "Not every specimen is perfect."

"No, I wasn't expecting you to actually answer my question."

"Why wouldn't I answer your question?"

"Because it's none of my business."

"Why are you asking then?"

"I'm… curious."

"I bet you are," Marion can see  _ something  _ in the way she moves that makes it clear that she's in pain. "Let me guess, you never really expended much time with an alpha."

"Maybe not, definitely no one like you."

"Defective specimen, like I said," she's not sure if she likes  _ this _ . "Anyhow. Can I leave through the door or should I, I don't know, jump off the window?"

"Nobody is jumping off the window."

"Ok. You said I shouldn't be here."

"Yes, not that you should  _ jump off the window _ . We're on the fourth floor."

"Ok."

She notices that Dominick buttons up her jacket quite fast for someone with shaky hands. Maybe she's used to this, maybe she's just in a hurry after what Marion said. She finishes dressing quickly, like someone that is used to put clothes fast. She's probably trained for that, for suiting up quickly like a soldier in the war. She thinks most soldiers dress like that, all fast and efficient, even if she does avoid having soldiers as clients. 

"Will you give Natallia a report or something?"

"Maybe," Dominick nods. "You should go to the infirmary or something like that."

"I'll."

"I don't believe that tho."

"Put on that report of yours."

"I sure will."

"Good. How far am I from the guard booth?"

"We're three blocks southwest," she nods. "Will you get in trouble?"

"Maybe with my doctor."

"You have a personal doctor?"

"Thought I mention I'm a defective specimen."

"If you say so."

* * *

"The soldier made a chain. A chain! A fucking chain of fire!" Are the words that she hears as soon as she steps into the bar, Marion sees the young man hitting his closed fists on the table. "That's not how fire fucking works, that alpha bastard."

Marion decided to have a free night, that bar was mostly frequented by alleged Fire-Criers and other people associated with them. She recognizes the voice, the same young Fire-Crier that got into an argument with an older Tornado about the beta that she was babysitting. She hopes he doesn't recognize her, she's way too curious to ignore him. So she sits as close as she can on the bar counter, her back turned to him and his peers.

She doesn't know how he's free three nights later. But she also knows that Fire-Criers seem to be  _ everywhere  _ and she is far from interested in the politics of all those underground groups.

"It's just an ice-elemental technique," a woman answers after the boy lists half a dozen offensive curses towards alphas. "Maybe an ice-elemental trained her."

"Well, little stress fireball here said she doesn't look older than mid-'20s, there's no way she was already trained in an  _ advanced  _ technique of  _ another _ element, " the other man of the trio says. "From  _ all  _ the soldiers that make these routes, you had to get in trouble with the prodigy?"

"She's not a prodigy, she's an alpha." The boy answers with  _ a lot  _ of disdain.

"They have those too," the man says. "There's a reason why the Tornados have more territory and fewer members."

"You say that because your kid is an alpha."

"No, I say this because I  _ know  _ things. I pay attention to the facts."

"And your kid is an alpha."

"And what you're gonna do about it?" He growls.

"Try to guess."

"Both of you stop," the woman says, Marion hears the sound of someone punching the table and the scent of wood burning. "You're two grown adults, we don't have time for this shit."

"I'm not the one with an alpha cub," if Marion had to guess, she'd say the boy was raised inside the group. Or has the worst possible experience with an alpha. 

"You don't have a cub at all," the woman pointed out.

"I have no plans of being  _ bred _ ."

"Let's see if this will still be true when you fall in love."

"I won't fall in love with a fucking alpha."

"You never know the future."

Marion could agree. How uncertain the future is probably is one of the scariest things about life and she doesn't want to think about it. There are too many things Marion happily avoids thinking about. Because life is easier when you move through it with your head empty.

* * *

Her apartment, according to the beta boy she's training, smells faintly like the alpha almost a  _ week  _ after she spent the night there. He says that it's not  _ that  _ strong and it's almost unnoticeable. But she decides to make some deep cleaning to avoid any possible trouble she could get with Fire-Criers or anyone else. She's almost sure that the scent would be gone in another day or two.

_ You can never be safe enough. _

She's in the middle of cleaning her couch when Natallia calls her, she's been waiting for this. She grabs her little notepad – because Marion is an organized woman – with the bullet points. It's not many, but she likes to make sure she has all the info she may need.

"Hey," Natallia says.

"Hey. Had a good heat?"

"Heats are annoying."

"I guess they are," she agrees, knowing only that annoying pre-period increased horniness. "Your parents got you a very stubborn fiancee."

"What did she do?"

Marion proceeds to tell her with all the possible details. Letting clear she told Dominick to not get into that fight. And putting some attention on the whole  _ defective specimen  _ speech the alpha had. It was confusing and she didn't like it and she lets Natallia know it.

"I didn't know about it either."

"Won't you two marry?"

"I thought I told you we aren't friends."

"Yeah, yeah," Marion keeps mindlessly doodling on her notepad. "Is that a real thing tho?"

"I… I don't know. I think it has something to do with how her powers don't seem to work well."

"She made a fire-chain."

"That's… not a fire move."

"I know. But how she did it if her powers don't work well?"

"I'm not sure," Marion can imagine Natallia frowning. "Awesome, I'll marry this woman in a few months and I know nothing about her."

"Try to talk to her."

"I tried."

"And?"

"She said I'm twenty years late."

"Maybe you are."

"You're supposed to be on my side!" Marion giggles.

"I am, but you know, both of you didn't do anything to be friends."

"Ugh," the woman groans and curses under her breath. "Being human is so much easier."

"Maybe. Maybe not. You will never know."

"You don't have to marry someone you don't want to."

"She doesn't seem to be the worst."

"You don't like alphas, Marion, you can't judge."

"I had one sleeping on my couch, I can judge. I think you'll be fine."

"I hope you're right."

Marion is a good judge of character. She's starting to suspect that Dominick is an actual nice alpha that just wants to do her job. It's what it seems with the information she has. So she truly believes that Natallia will be fine - maybe not fully happy, but she'll be better than other omegas with other worse alphas.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I guess... the plot thickens?


	7. VII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is a little different. I wrote as a oneshot about the days that passed in Marion's chapter. But then I decided that it should be an actual chapter, it has some info. There are a few short flashback scenes. CW for burns, blood and child abuse.

Dominick is aware that she should know better than contradicting her doctor. In her defense, two weeks is fucking too long for her, she needs to work, needs to keep her mind occupied as mindless as walking the same route is. To say she was caught in surprise when she had to interfere in a small gang fight is an understatement. And that Marion is around too. But she managed it quickly enough, even if she made her injuries a lot worse.

She feels how her clothes overheat, making the burns on her back go back to the state they were after she was hurt. And how her arms burn slowly while keeping the tight grip on her chains of fire.

So no surprise when she can't breathe and faints as soon she is inside a guard booth.

 _Beau's defective spawn._ Her brain repeats in a loop as she drifts to unconsciousness. She barely registers that Marion is following her into the guard booth, she only needs somewhere to sit down so she doesn't collapse face-first in the stone floor. 

* * *

She's vaguely aware of people holding her, muttering curses under their breath. Dominick knows she's a heavy woman, it's typical of alphas and fire-elementals, and she's built exactly like what she is. Her mind thinks the beta boy is helping Marion to help her, even if she doesn’t know if she’s being carried by them. It’s probably, considering that they’re carrying her with her arms over their shoulder. Soldiers carry other soldiers alone, over their shoulders, and with long fast steps because soldiers only need to be carried when they’re badly injured.

She doesn’t know how badly injured she is, but she can feel the undershirt rubbing against her upper arms skin.

She feels nausea burn, cold press around her chest and making it hard to breath. Makes it almost impossible to think. All she can do is just let them carry her to wherever they're carrying her to. 

* * *

_Dominick looks at her red hands._

_They're burned and bloody._

_"Hey, it's ok, it's ok," Deniece holds her shoulders and Dominick realizes she's shaking._

_"Mom…" she whimpers, knowing Beau won't be happy about it._

_"It's ok," Deniece kisses her head. "We need to clean your wounds first."_

_When Dominick doesn't move, Deniece sighs and walks around her. The little alpha is too big for it, but Deniece lifts her anyway. She adjusts her grip a few times until Dominick is safe on her arms. Dominick grabs her shirt, leaving streaks of blood on the fabric. Deniece holds her tightly, whispering comfort words. Saying accidents like this are normal. Dominick doesn't have control enough to always keep her body at a safe temperature, especially her hands. She will break things with heat many times before she can control it._

_It's scary._

_Very scary._

_Even if her mom is right there and not going anywhere. Beau is too volatile for childish mistakes to be only childish mistakes._

* * *

When Dominick starts to wake up she registers two things.

1) This is not her bed. It's not a bed at all, actually. It has the wrong shape and she doesn't fit the way she does in beds.

2) Her upper arms and back are hurting so much that she barely can breathe. The red burnt skin straining under the pressure her lungs and muscles make to expand.

She lifts her head and turns, smelling the air. She doesn't recognize the place or the scents. Only the scent of plain noodles that make her stomach turn. She turns to find Marion looking at her. She's on Marion's place for some reason – _oh, right, I collapsed in exhaustion._

 _I'm fucked_.

* * *

A thing Dominick has always been scared of is: collapsing from exhaustion in front of someone.

It happened once with Ava. In a moment she was in the dorms and then she woke up In the infirmary. She hates being carried around like a useless piece of shit. As useless as Beau says she is. (She doesn't really need more and more proofs that she's defective.) 

But maybe she’s almost painfully scared of letting people see her naked. The only person she felt safe enough to be naked in front of is Ava (she doesn’t think Ava knows how important she is to Dominick). She doesn’t like the idea of being hurt, collapse in exhaustion and wake up in different clothes. (She thinks it would feel like a violation, she doesn’t like the idea of being undressed without being conscious, not even by professionals or by someone she trusts, like Ava.) Dominick was quite relieved that Marion only took off her jacket and boots, something tells her that Marion isn’t the kind of person that violates one’s privacy this way.

"I said two _weeks_ " the doctor says when she enters the infirmary. "Not two _days_."

"Sorry," she answers sheepishly.

The man takes a deep breath: "Let me fix you up."

Dominick nods and lets the doctor do his job. He guides her to one of the beds, she hops up quickly and takes off her jacket. It’s painful to move, she thinks her back is all red and peeling. The doctor helps her to take it off, he’s effective in his moves and she appreciates it. She smells the scent of some burnt flesh when she tries to take off the undershirt. She needs more help with it than with the jacket. She hadn’t noticed how there were some singed fabrics on her cuffs.

"Second-degree burns, some of the dressing fabric is stuck to your skin. It'll be painful, lay with your back turned to me.” Dominick does. "Open up your mouth," he says.

She obeys and the man places the mouthguard. Dominick isn't happy with the fact that she needed something to bite so many times that the doctor molded a mouthguard for her. But it's better than pieces of clothes she used to bite. She doesn't look at her arm, the pain is enough to let her know how bad it is. All this discomfort is worse than the little voice in her brain that doesn't stop repeating _you're nothing but Beau's defective spawn._

The doctor pulls the dressing, the pain is white-hot and melts her brain. She bites harder, letting out a muffled scream of pain. Dominick maintains her body as still as she can. So still that she’s not breathing at all.

"You have to breathe," the doctor tells her. She tries, it _hurts_. "Ok, ok," he says. "Warmth mapping, close your eyes, and do that."

She nods.

Dominick closes her eyes. She knows she can't go too far, her body feels heavy and weak. She's also better at the method her mom taught her years ago, using the ground as the base to her map instead of a mental grade. It may limit when she can do it, since she needs to touch the ground with her hand or her foot, but it forms a clearer and larger image. The military version is limited to a perimeter of barely ten meters. Still useful tho.

_"Here, follow my lead," the omega says, crouching and putting her right hand on the floor. "I'll teach you warmth mapping."_

_"Oh," Dominick quickly imitates her._

_"Can you feel the heat from earth?"_

_"Yes, mom."_

_"Now, close your eyes and try to feel it around you. A plane of stable heat coming from the dirt under us," she tries, her sense interrupted by the massive don't of heat in front of her. "Ignore me."_

_She nods, but she can't see far. Or much. It's just a very dark red plane that barely seems to be out of her arm range. She can see herself, partially, almost blue while her mom burns in yellow in front of her. Training with mom is fun, but this still a little bit frustrating and boring._

_She opens her eyes when her mom's yellow suddenly changes to dark red. Almost as dark as the figure coming._

She's pulled from the memory when the doctor pulls a particularly long strip of fabric and she's sure some skin goes with it. She grunts and breathes hard, red sparkles escaping her nostrils. It makes her chest burn even worse, she knows she really fucked up now that _any_ usage of her powers cause an unbearable pain. 

"Sorry," he says. "It's the last I can pull, there are some fibers. I need to scrub now."

She only nods. She can't complain about being brought back to present reality. The memories evolving both Deniece and Beau are her least favorite. She knows what happens in that memory – Beau never liked fire, she never liked how close they were and despised how Deniece started teaching Dominick almost as soon as there were sparkles on her fingertips – and she doesn't need that now. She hopes the doctor thinks her shaking is from pain. It partially is, but still…

She almost feels ice claws on her ribcage, suffocating her and taking away her warmth. The thick heavy collar squeezing around her neck and burning her skin with the coldness that seems to freeze anything it touches. 

"Dominick, Dominick, _Dominick_ ," she blinks a few times and turns her head to him. "I'll start scrubbing now, ok?"

"Ok."

It hurts _a lot_. It makes her want to throw up. There isn't anything to throw up, her last meal was yesterday's dinner. She isn't even sure how she's awake with such low energy left and the pain. She bites down so hard she thinks the mouthguard will break between her teeth, or it will break her teeth. The doctor moves as fast as he can, trying to be done with this part of cleaning. Dominick knows how hard it is to take off fibers from melted flesh.

The world spins.

She _can’t breath_.

Ice claws cut her lungs up.

Ice squeezes a fragile child neck so hard it's close to just breaking it apart. 

It's so cold that she'll break in a thousand pieces if she moves. 

"Keep breathing," the doctor says. "I know it hurts. But keep breathing," she nods, trying, but the ice is impossible to escape. "You’re getting cold," he mutters. "Stay here."

She nods weakly, as if she could move. She barely could _breathe_ . It keeps burning and it’s like her body is fighting against the action. It doesn’t make sense, just like her body cooling down doesn’t make sense. It should happen sometimes, when she gets burned but her body _doesn’t work well. She’s Beau’s defective spawn_ . Just _broken_ and _wrong_ and _a failure._ Then why breath? Then why stay warm.

"No, no, no, no, don’t black out on me."

* * *

_"_ **_Where_ ** _your breath comes from is the key for crying fire," Deniece says, they’re in front of each other in the garden, the sun high in the sky. Peak summer, peak fire-elemental power. "If you breathe with your belly, your fire will be colder but will last longer. If you breathe with your lungs, your fire will be hotter but will last less."_

_"Which is better, mom?"_

_"It depends on the situation. Crying fire is a very unique skill, despite being the name of a… shady civilian organization. But tornadoes are a rare air skill and also the namesake of a similar organization."_

_"If it’s so unique, why name an organization with it?"_

_"For power, for fear. But this is too complicated for you."_

_"Mom," she whines and deflates._

_"See? You react like a child."_

_"I’m sorry," she says, back to the rigid posture even if she can hear the hint of amusement._

_"No need to apologize. You’re a child reacting like a child," Deniece says softly, she offers her hand and Dominick takes it. It’s soft even if it’s calloused by training. Her mom is a soldier, just not officially. "You never need to apologize for me."_

* * *

Dominick feels cold when she wakes up, even if she’s under two layers of blankets. She closes her eyes again and tries to breathe with her stomach, it hurts a little less than when she’s breathing with her chest. Feels a little less natural, but she’d rather feel less natural than so much pain just for breathing. She focuses a bit in warmth mapping for a moment, trying to not fall into a rabbit hole inside her head.

(Dominick firmly believes that mental state affects her body too much, being Beau’s defective spawn affected her body, but thinking about certain things didn’t help.)

She imagines a black rectangle as the floor, even if she knows it probably is a dark red. She lets her sense put forms onto the plane. The first thing that forms is her bed and her form, a reddish yellow instead of almost blue. She keeps forcing herself to breathe deeply to warm up and almost misses the human-shaped yellow form beside her, she opens her eyes and looks at her companion.

"Hey, you’re awake," Ava says.

"Yeah," she sounds hoarse and Ava gives her a cup. She smells it before taking a sip, it’s one of those teas her doctor gives her after bad days. Both know they don’t really work, the taste just makes her feel a little bit better.

"I was so worried," Ava says quietly. Dominick puts her hand on the bed, palm turned upwards. And Ava hesitates for a moment before holding her hand. "You have to listen to your doctor."

"I- I need to work."

"You can’t work if you destroy your body," she sighs and lets her head hang low.

"I’m sorry."

"You don’t have to apologize for everything."

"I... I know." 

"Do you?" 

* * *

_"Shh, it’s ok, just breathe with me," Deniece’s hands are roaring hot against Dominick’s arms._

_She’s trying, she wants to say. But she can’t. Her chest’s muscles are spasming over and over again. It doesn’t let her lugs take air into it. She’s shaking violently and barely can think. She’s aware that Beau is close by with her menacing dark red heat signature, her hands so cold they almost seem black,_

_Deniece sneaks her hands under Dominick’s body, ignoring the soaked clothes, and pulls her against her ches._

_"Did you lose your mind?" She growls towards the ice-elemental. "You can’t throw a kid into a freezing lake."_

_"Aren’t you training her? She should be able to warm herself up," her voice sounds so cold. She feels the cold clawing on her ribs and trying to reach her heart._

_"She’s a child!" Deniece says louder. "She’s_ **_your_ ** _pup, what the fuck is wrong with you?"_

 _"She’s not my_ **_pup_ ** _, she’s a defective spawn. It’s been eleven years and you’re yet to give me a viable heir"_

 _Dominick can feel Deniece’s growl deep in her chest, the water starts to dry off slowly and she knows it’s only Deniece’s warmth that is doing this. The woman doesn’t answer,_ **_she knows Beau is right_ ** _, she thinks even if Deniece holds her tighter and gets up. Dominick knows she’s definitely too big for it. She’s almost as tall as her mom ,but Deniece doesn’t seem to care. Dominick just holds onto her, trying to absorb Deniece’s warmth._

_Ice still suffocating her, but it’s a little bit easier to breath._

* * *

"Sometimes I think you should retire from the army," Ava says, sitting beside Dominick while the alpha is laying on her stomach shirtless. It took a lot of pleading for her doctor to let her go back instead of staying in the infirmary for a month.

"No."

"You keep getting hurt," the sigma frowns, her fingers tracing the bandage around Dominick's upper arm.

Even a  _ week  _ after making the fire-chain to stop the Fire-Crier boy, her arm still not healed enough to not need bandages, she knows how her doctor is worried that it'll have ever-lasting damage. She thinks it's because her body has to redirect energy to different burns, this is the most she got burned since the time she got into a fight without any protection.  _ Beau's defective spawn  _ keeps repeating in her brain, a mocking voice repeating harsh words of a bitter truth. A good fire-element alpha would be considerably healed at this point, but not her.

"You know it's because I'm-"

"If you say  _ Beau's defective spawn _ I'll kick your balls so hard it'll retract into your body."

"But-"

"It's not the truth," she moves her hands up to Dominick's shoulder. "You haven't talk like this for months, why now?"

"I didn't get hurt by my element for months. Beau wasn't happy."

"Oh, I heard something about her coming here. She said some bullshit, didn't she?"

"It's not- she had a point."

"Abuse doesn't have a point," Dominick turns her head, looking at the wall instead of the woman beside her. "Dominick."

"She still had a point. I'm a captain at twenty years old because I'm a 'prodigy'. But prodigies don't get hurt like this."

"You get hurt because you were compromised while growing up."

"First, that's just a theory you came up with. Second, I wasn't  _ compromised  _ growing up."

"I use  _ compromised _ because you don't like the actual words."

"Training and discipline?"

"Torture and abuse," Dominick grunts. "See?"

"It's not that."

"Tell me again how you learned making chains and collars and shackles?"

"They're useful, you know it. Helps to catch runaway criminals."

"And how you learned to swim? In a  _ freezing  _ lake?"

"Useful, again, in a cold place."

"You can go long periods without eating, it's not natural."

"I can survive longer than my peers."

"Stop justifying it."

"I'm not justifying."

"Yes you are," Ava touches her back, close to her neck and her thumbs runs over one of the ice-burn scars she has on her neck. "You call yourself Beau's defective spawn even if you are the strongest and smartest of our squadron. You're only  _ twenty  _ and you're a goddamn captain. You can do things with that a lot of fire-elementals can't do. You're amazing and you keep acting like you're less than a person."


	8. VIII

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dominick gets hurt during training, Ava is probably the only good person she has in her life. CW for injury, blood, mild sexual content, mentions of parental abuse and burns.

Training with Ava is fun - almost as fun as bedroom activities - and helps Dominick to not think too much. She has been thinking too much in the last few weeks. Getting hurt by her own element after so many months pushed her back into the  _ Beau's defective spawn _ mindset, which she knows makes Ava upset so she doesn't talk about it. She agrees that Ava does has a point about Beau not being the best person around. But it doesn't mean that she's wrong about Dominick. 

(She tries to not think about her mom.

She's far from the first omega to run away from a bad alpha. Dominick doesn't blame her, she can only imagine that Beau was never satisfied with only harsh words and a bit of ice like with Dominick. Beau is not a good person, but never crossed  _ that _ line.

Runaways omegas usually take their cubs with them, her mom didn't. 

So she doesn't think about it.

She has to keep the illusion that  _ one  _ of her parents loved her at some point.)

So she calls Ava for sparring sessions. She doesn't want to talk, Ava is just too  _ sweet  _ with her. She doesn't think she deserves someone taking care of her. It feels  _ wrong _ . And it doesn't make sense. However, the fire of fighting makes sense. She'd train normally, sparing with other fire-elementals, if her injuries weren't proving to have long lasting effects.

The training armor is too heavy for her still aching body. It makes her feel too warm and uncomfortable, so she chooses to wear one of the few shorts she has and a sweatshirt. Ava frowns, but the hybrid is also wearing shorts and a tank top. They're not properly dressed for training, but they trained together enough times to just go for it.

It all goes well for the next hour until both miscalculate.

Ava goes for an attack a bit too high, reaching Dominick's face instead of her shoulder. Dominick doesn't move fast enough, a little slower than she is in a normal situation. The sword doesn't hit her hard, but it's the sharp tip. Dominick doesn't remember the last time she was cut, it's a quick sudden sensation when the blade hits her. Ava panics and drops the sword before her brain registers the pain.

Red hot pain hits her hard enough for her to lose her breath. Instincts kick, her sword falls by her feet and her hands fly to the fresh wound on her face.

"Nickie!" Ava grabs her arm and Dominick frowns, feeling her hands getting wetter and warmer. "Dominick."

"Hm," she tastes blood and realizes she's biting her tongue. "Fuck," she mumbles and her whole face burns when her mouth moves.

"I'm sorry, I didn't-"

"'s ok," she increases the pressure, the blood soaking her sleeve slowly.

"We have to go to the doctor," she keeps a hand on Dominick's forearm and puts her other hand on her lower back. "He'll kill us."

Dominick nods, the initial shock wearing off quickly. She pokes her inner cheek with her tongue, glad that she doesn't feel a cut. So maybe the doctor won't kill her and her friend.

(But Beau won't like it a bit, she knows it, Dominick is a shameful child without a facial scar. For a split second, she hopes it disfigures her so much that Beau will hate her enough to not consider Dominick her child. But Ava is there and even if she gets scars almost invisible, her friend will be burdened by guilt.)

She almost leans closer to Ava's touch, it's better than the pain on her cheek.

* * *

Dominick doesn't need to open her eyes to know that Ava is looking at her. Looking at the bandage on her face to be more exact. Her nose is still being assaulted by the scent of her own blood and the herbs the doctor used.

"You have to change your clothes," Ava says, softly. Dominick doesn't like when she sounds soft this way, as if her voice could break the alpha.

"Oh," Dominick says, looking down and noticing how her sweatshirt is dirty. "'s lot of blood."

Her words break and fail, the bandage tug on sensitive skin: "Yes, you've bled a lot. Let me help you?"

Dominick nods, even moving her head hurts for some reason. She thinks the scents must be overwhelming a part of her brain. The fire-elemental lifts her hands to let Ava pulls the sweatshirt off, her burned arm is almost fully healed, but the scar tissue seems to affect her motion range. She'll need help with that and Dominick can already hear Beau yelling at her face for being such a failure and a goddamn useless defective piece of shit.

"You're not defective," Ava says, Dominick blinks and focuses on her. Ava pokes her forehead. "Your crinkle. It's always the same when you start to mentally spiral in Beau's broken pup bullshit."

"Ava."

"You are not," she holds Dominick's face. Her other hand comes to cup her face too, but she changes trajectory midway, almost inaudibly wincing, and lands the hand on Dominick's shoulder. "Beau is just a fucking jerk."

Dominick's protest died when Ava kissed her. It's soft in a way that she does only sometimes, only when Dominick is hurt. It's so soft it feels wrong, so delicate that makes her wonder when Ava will hit and yell at her. (But it never comes.) It's a touch that makes her wonder if there's something more between them (not that it matters that much.)

"Ava," she whispers.

"I'm sorry."

"'s ok."

"I've hurt you," her hand moves to her neck, thumb caressing her scent gland. "I promised I wouldn't hurt you."

"'s ok," Dominick repeats and closes her eyes when Ava kisses her again.

The cut will leave a scar, that's undeniable. Probably not the ugliest, she's sure that the one on her chest is the worst she has. She's more worried with Ava's mind, she remembers how the girl genuinely cried and looked upset when they trained together for the first time and she caused a bruise on her shoulder.

Ava's hand moves down from her shoulder to her chest, fingers tracing the border of the scar that spreads partially over her left breast. The touch is a mix of gentle caressing and provoking. Any comfort is welcomed. Even if she doesn't blame Ava for the incident (it was Dominick who couldn't move out of the way), it's a weird concept to be hurt and comforted by the same person. The same person that usually only means comfort, sexual and non-sexual, so Dominick is more than happy to be comforted by Ava.

"Do you want me to stop?" Ava asks, Dominick denies with her head, the sigma let's her hand move a little more to the side, touching her nipple lightly. "Are you sure?"

"Yes."

"Good," but instead of going forward, Ava kneels and starts to take off one of her boots. "You need a shower first."

"Oh."

"Do you prefer a bathtub?" Dominick nods. "Ok, dear. Wait a minute."

Ava kisses her forehead and disappears into the bathroom. While waiting, Dominick looks down, there's some dried blood on her chest, on her arm and stuck on her fingernails. She grabs the small dagger she keeps on her bedside table and works on cleaning her nails.

It's Ava's scent that tells her Ava is back. Dominick watches Ava finishing taking off boots. The sigma barely needs to touch her is enough to make her feel calmer. Relaxed enough for her to start feeling the rest of her body aching again. She knows it's her body redirecting energy to her new wound. It's a weak burn under her skin. Ava helps her out of the shorts and briefs, she giggles because she only kissed and touched Dominick for a few seconds and the alpha is already sporting a semi-hard.

"You're so sensitive," she says.

''m attracted to 'u."

Ava smirks. If half of her face wasn't starting to burn, the painkillers wearing off, she'd say something like  _ and you're who gets dripping wet when I say I wanna fuck _ . The sigma holds her hand and pulls her to the bathroom, her legs feel heavy and she's only moving because Ava is moving. Dominick likes the mix of scents that fills the little room. Her favorite soap, aromatic herbs and it's all soft enough that she can still smell Ava. Close in a small space helps, sigmas usually have light scents that people don't even notice.

(She doesn't know if it's because Ava is her closest friend or Ava has a stronger scent than other sigmas.)

Ava guides into the bathtub. She doesn't like feeling like she needs help, even if with Ava feels less humiliating than with Natallia, she is just more comfortable with the sigma in general. But having someone helping her to take a bath for the second time in a month is not an experience she wanted to have. But at least this times she's not recently burned, and she's being touched by someone she knows and trust instead of Natallia.  _ Congratulations on not knowing or trusting your future wife. _

"You have to relax, Nickie," Ava says, carefully cleaning the dried blood on Dominick's chest.

"Don't like it," she mumbles. She almost can see the apology forming in Ava's brain, ready to be said. "Being taken care of."

She sees the sadness in Ava's eyes. She doesn't like it, the sigma deserves better than being in pain because of Dominick. The alpha reaches out, her arm dripping wet (but Ava is already soaked), and caresses the woman's face. They stare at each other for a moment, Ava has speckles of reddish brown that reminds Dominick of Ava's fire-elemental heritage. She moves her hand to the back of her neck and pulls her closer, the kiss is harder and deeper this time. Their position is awkward but it works (they had weirder positions actually). Dominick grunts in a mix of pleasure and pain, it makes Ava pull back.

"Hey," Dominick says weakly.

"Are you ok?" The alpha nods. "Sure?"

"Just touch me."

Ava nods. The kiss is softer now, more a touch of lips than feverish kiss. She keeps a hand on her shoulder and Dominick thinks there's no way Ava is comfortable. But the sigma doesn't seem to mind. She kisses down, following Dominick's jawline on the uninjured side of her face. Her other hand touch the scars on her chest tenderly. It's a touch that is almost as if Ava thinks it'll hurt.

(It's scary to be touched this gently.)

Ava almost giggles when Dominick breathes hard, reacting to her fingers moving down her belly. The sigma doesn't need to look at her to touch the right places, presses her short nails down Dominick's abs. The alpha moans when Ava finally gets down there. Ava's hand wraps around Dominick's shaft, which had risen to full hardness when Ava kissed her neck. 

Water is far from the best lube, a little bit of spit is better, but Dominick doesn't mind a little bit of dry touch. She just wants Ava to touch her. She needs Ava to keep touching her. The sigma keeps her hand moving in a slow but steady rhythm, her thumb going over her sensitive glans. Ava bites and sucks on her neck and chest, knowing how the alpha likes to be marked, how when Ava is a bit possessive, it makes Dominick impossibly turned on. Ava bites over her scent gland and squeezes the base of her shaft, knowing Dominick likes the pressure even when she's not about to pop a knot.

"Come on, Nickie," she whispers against her ear. "Be a good girl and cum for me," Dominick whines, thrusting her hips up, unconsciously fucking into her hand. "Come on, baby."

Dominick closes her eyes, holding onto Ava's shoulder almost hard enough to bruise. She can smell the arousal coming from Ava, it's part of what pushes her over the edge, a deep moan vibrating through her chest. Ava's hand move slower, Dominick shivers, a bit hypersensitive to touches right after an orgasm. The sigma kisses her softly.

"You're so adorable," Ava whispers.

"'U jerk me off 'n' call me cute?"

"Yes," she kisses the tip of Dominick's nose. "Very cute."

* * *

"You think Natallia will hate me even more now?" Dominick asks, her voice sounds weird. She's a bit out of breath from their previous comfort sex.

"I don't think she hates  _ you _ , she hates the arranged marriage. Like you do," Ava caresses her chest, Ava always softly touches a scar when she's comforting Dominick. "You're still beautiful anyway."

"I…"

"The doctor said you'll heal fine. She's lucky. You're pretty, hot and you'll be a great wife."

Dominick nods slowly: "I'm not… I'm not sure I'll be a good parent."

"You're nothing like Beau," Ava says firmly. "You're nothing like your parents."

"Ava."

"Come on," Ava almost growls. " _ Both _ of them failed you. You deserved better, you  _ deserve  _ better," she repeats lower, sad: "You deserve  _ so much  _ better."

Dominick doesn't answer. Her brain repeating  _ you're just Beau's defective spawn  _ and  _ Natallia will be disgusted by me _ . Self-loathing burns brighter and brighter. She needs distraction. So she kisses Ava again, her cheek hurting but not enough to make her want to stop. She gently pushes the sigma to make her lay on her back.

"Just fuck me," she whispers.

"Aren't you in pain?"

"Distraction is my favorite painkiller."

"Hm," she looks between them to find Dominick almost fully hard. "Your rut?"

"In a few weeks. I thought I told you that I'm attracted to you."

"Ok. Alright. Captain stamina."

* * *

For Dominick’s utter despair, Ava decided to stay. Not that she wanted to be alone, but it was safe to be alone. She’s more than smart enough to know that she’ll have nightmares and that heating up is a possibility. But she also can’t pretend she doesn’t want the comfort coming from Ava, it’s something she’ll miss after the marriage (she doesn’t think Natallia will comfort her or even really talk to her out of important conversations).

She wants to protest but lets Ava pull her to the bed, naked except by bandages, close under the thin blanket and they fit well together. She lets Ava pull her closer so Dominick can lay her head on her chest, ear close to her heart and the firm rhythm is like a sweet lullaby. Ava kisses her forehead multiple times, her arm and her back and whispers sweet words.

(Dominick doesn’t really know how sharing a bed with her can be white hot pornographic sex and also comfort so sweet and lovely that it hurts.)

So she falls asleep under gentle words and loving touches.

But in the dark, there are large hands holding her weak thin arms and throwing her into infinite coldness. She tries to breath, red sparkles barely leave her nose before disappearing in the cold water. She kicks and trashes and tries to go up, there’s only cold everywhere. Her hands hit the ice covering the lake, a thick layer and she lets the heat from her core move to her fingertips. The sparkles are not warm enough to melt the ice and set her free.

She keeps trying to get warmer and warmer and her chest is being torn apart.

“Dominick, Dominick, Dominick!”

She moves and flinches and suddenly she’s on the floor. Her nose twitches, distress and fire and burned skin fill her brain. She blinks a bit.

“Dominick,” she looks up to find Ava looking down from the edge of the bed. “Nickie?”

“I-” she blinks. Frowns. Smells the air. “Ava?”

“Yes, hey, you’re safe.”

“I-I-,” her brain registers the scent of burned skin coming from Ava. “I’ve hurt you.”

“I’m fine.”

“N-no,” she gets up, her hands shaking.

“It’s fine.”

“Let me see.”

“Nickie.”

“Let me see.”

Ava notices the worry on her eyes and nods. The skin on her chest, between her breasts, where Dominick had her nose pressed against, is pink. Dominick asks her to turn. Two angry red handprints stand out, she gulps with how her hands cover over half of her back too easily.

“It’s alright, Nickie,” Ava turns again, she puts a hand on the unharmed side of her face, the other on her chest. “You just had a bad dream.”

“I’ve hurt ‘u,” Ava’s eyes shift to the bandage on her face.

“You just had a bad dream.”

“It’s not an-”

“You just had a bad dream. About what?”

“Swimmin’ lessons.”

“That explains it. Will you feel better if I let you put some medicine?” Dominick nods. “Ok, ok. It’s alright. It’s not your fault.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I should stop hurting Dominick.


End file.
